The Sun.
London, England, 1863-01-30 00:00:00

THE CIVIL WAR IN AMERICA.

-...-------

(Rom the limes' CArrespondent.)
NEW YORK, Jan. 13.

Of all the crises through which the Northern Go-
vernment and people have passed since Ole outbreak
of this unhappy war the present is the severest.
The perils of the nation have assumed a threefold
shape—military, financial, and political. It is dif-
ficult to decide which of them will prove the most
serious, and whether their combined operation will
not exhaust the patience of the most patient people
in the world, and make an end, once and for ever,
of the utterly inefficient, though possibly well mean-
ing Administration of Mr. Lincoln, an Administra
tion that mismanages everything which it touches ;
that inspires few people with respect, and no one
with confidence; and that is only tolerated by sut-
lers and contractors, and the horde of nouveaux
riches who are making, or have made, large fortunes
out of the miseries of the country. " We, of this
Congress and this Administration," said the Presi-
dent in his last Message, " will be remembered in
spite of ourselves. No personal significance or in-
significance can spare one or another of us. The
fiery trial through which we pass will light us down
in honour or dishonour to the latest generation."
The words are true. But have Mr. Lincoln and his
friends ever asked themselves in what direction the
light is now shining? The country is almost at its
last gasp; and what are " we of this Congress "
doing ? We are extending the horrors and increas-
ing the obstinacy of the war by an attempt to excite
an insurrection of the slaves. We are supporting
the Administration feebly when it is right, and
strenuously when it is wrong. We are voting im-
mense issues of irredeemable paper money, and
forcing up the premium on gold to 44 per cent. to-
day, and probably to 50 or 60 per cent. a month
hence. We are leaving our army unpaid, but vot-
ing millions of dollars to purchase the freedom of
slaves in Missouri. We are authorising the Go-
vernment to raise and equip an army of 150,000
negroes, who do not make good soldiers, and
with whom white men will not serve, and
thereby confessing that a war of twenty millions of
white Northern men cannot be carried on against
lye or six millions of white Southern men without
the aid of an inferior and despised race. We are
uttering our determination in the face of the scan-
dalized world to " exterminate" every male white
in the South rather than consent to a separation,
which the South demands with a unanimity rarely
witnessed and with a heroism never surpassed. We
are setting the law and the Constitution at defiance,
and urging the President to do the same. We
are jealous of every General who shows the least
ability, lest he should become our master, and treat
us as Cromwell treated the Long Parliament,which
we so closely resemble. These are some of the
things which "we of this Congress" are doing ;
and which may serve to show whether the light
that will shine upon our names in the latest genera-
tion will be that of honour or of dishonour. And
what are "we of this Administration" doing to
gain the prize we covet or the blame we deprecate P
We are divided omong ourselves. We have no
bond of Union. We each of us think we could
make a much better President than the man we
serve. We are filled with conceit and arrogance.
We of the War Department have no capacity to
superintend, supervise, and direct the immense
military operations that are necessary to subjugate
the South, or even to save the North from invasion,
and yet we persist in superintending, supervising,
and directing, though we thereby defeat all the ,
plans and combinations of our Generals and reap a
harvest of defeats instead of victories. We of the
Naval Department can order the construction of
iron-clads of doubtful efficiency at an enormous ex-
pense, but we cannot put a stop to the ravages of the
"pirate" Alabama, or prevent that one vessel from
inflicting the most aggravating losses upon American
commerce, or transferring the whole trade of the
Atlantic into British bottoms. We of the State
Department can do nothing but provoke Foreign
Powers by foolish words and arrogant assumptions,
and frighten ourselves daily by speculations about a
"mediation," or an " intervention," which, though
it might rescue the State from pending ruin, might
irritate the pride of our people. We of the Trea-
sury Department know so little of the laws of
fiaance and currency that we have flooded the
country with irredeemable paper, and are preparing
to flood it still more heavily. We have mortgaged
the energies and resources of the future, without
any reasonable ground to believe that the future
will accept the responsibility, and without even the
conviction in our own mind that we had any legal
or constitutional right to act as we have acted. We
have banished not only gold and silver from the
pockets of the people, but even the commonest little
nicked and copper cents—which in better days did
duty for English halfpence, but which had not half
the intrinsic value of English farthings; and to
such an extent have we depreciated the currency
that our paper promises to pay five cents (21d.)
are worth no more to the poor man who receives
them in wages than three cents were before the
war. And we, the President of this jumble of an
Administration, are a joker of jokes, of whom no-
body can say more than that "he means well." Is
this rapid recapitulation unjust or unfair ? Does it
express more than the truth, or less ? And if it be
true, as millions of patriotic Americans would con-
fess, what will be the verdict of history upon these
men—placed so high, to fall so low, and only saved
from present disgrace by the extreme tolerance and
good nature of a people who never knew trouble or
difficulty before, and who have not thoroughly
realized to their own minds the immensity of the
task they have undertaken, or the enormity of the
sacrifices they must make, whether they succeed or
fail.

This state of things is equally intolerable to the
Democrats and to the Republicans. The Democrats
have no influence in the Presidential Councils, for
Mr. Lincoln is not their President. They neither
elected him nor believe in him, and he has not so
acted during his term of office as to make himself
the President of the nation. The Republicans, who
have him in their keeping, are alarmed at the help-
lessness of their nominee and at the mischievous
antagonisms of his Secretaries ; they have, therefore,
renewed their efforts to overthrow the Administra-
tion. Twenty-six Senators, forming a clear ma-
jority of two-thirds of the " Rump" of a Senate that
now sits in Washington, alarmed at the financial
collapse, which is only a question of time, and
grows unpleasantly near ; alarmed also at the aspect
of military affairs in Tennessee, at Vicksburg, in
Missouri, in Texas, and on the Rappahannock; and
shamed by the humiliations that have everywhere
befallen the Federal cause, have memorialized Mr.
Lincoln to remodel his Ministry. They want a
more vigorous prosecution of the war, and believe
that this result can only be attained by a unani-
mity of purpose in the Councils of the President
which has never existed. Assuming, apparently,
that the President—who ought to be of no party—
is of their party, these 26 Republicans, who all
share the opinions of Mr. Chas. Sumner, their lead-
ing spirit, on the questions of slavery and " exter-
mination," should that alternative become neces-
sary, urge upon him to dismiss his present advisers,
and surround himself exclusively with statesmen
who 44 are the cordial, resolute, um wavering sup-
porters of the principles and purposes" involved in a
war a l'outrance. The presentedMemo.trtiaelehaosfbeennineen a-
s
to Mr. Lincoln by a mum'
tors, appointed for the purpose, who have given him
time to reflect before taking action. It is possible
is equally postai:4e that he
retain his Ministry. It
that he may resent this dictation and e 5, e
may yield, at ay ourt
ro,
whatever
Generals
sof personal
Hunter,
e dignity,
andand llh
Butlerue to menth as G
ea
command of his armies, and such
men as Mr. Sumner, Mr. Thaddeus Stevens, and
seals Fremont,
Mr. Owen Lovejoy to his councils ; but it is still
more possible that Mr. Seward, against whom the

memorial seems principally to be directed, will
throw up his portfolio; that Mr. Chase will follow
his example, as before ; and that in a few days Mr.
Lincoln will be engaged in the difficult task of con-
structing a new Cabinet. Were the Proclamation
of Emancipation not hopelessly in his way Mr.
Lincoln would have an opportunity to rise above
party considerations and make himself the Presi-
dent of the people. He could do this by recalling
Gen. M'Clellan to the post of Commander-in-Chiet
and installing the Conservatives in power, but as he
would thereby place himself in opposition to the
Senate, who have the veto on all his appointments,
and as he would, moreover, be compelled either to
rescind his Proclamation or allow it to become a
dead letter, it is too much to expect that he will in-
cur such serious risks of bringing all the m“chinery
of government to a dead lock. The next few days
will doubtless produce some curious developments.
It is in vain to speculate upon them. No one can
either predict or calculate what turn events will
take, but almost every one can see that a graver
crisis has never yet occurred in the history of the
republic.
The capture of Galveston in Texas and of the
Harriet Lane steamer have proved a heavy dis-
couragement to the Administration. That the
Confederates should regain Galveston was bad
enough, but that they should acquire another fast
ship to add to their pestilent little "navy," and
imitate the deeds of the Alabama, is looked upon as
intolerable. To add to this annoyance, the victory
of Gen. Rosecrans at Marfreesborough grows smaller
as the details arrive. It was a 'well-fought ieritst
of battles, and confers the highest honour on the
Federal commander, but it has left the Confederates
unsubdued, and has failed to decide the fate of Ten-
nessee, or greatly to modify the course of the war
in the South-west. The repulse of the Federals at
Vicksburg appears, on the other hand, to have been
more serious than was at first believed. The expe-
dition against that fortress has been abandoned for
the present, and Gen. Sherman has been relieved of
his command. The Federal fleet has sailed up the
Mississippi instead of down, as was intended; and
Gen. Banks, who was to have taken Port Hudson,
or tried to take it, simultaneously with the attack
of Gen. Sherman on Vicksburg, will probably see
rhason to desist from the attempt, when he learns
that the Confederates have been enabled, after res-
cuing Vicksburg, to send a large force to the sup-
port of the lower fortress. Altogether, the recent
campaigns in the South and South-west have failed
not so much for want of energy and bravery on the
part of the troopd and commanders as from defec-
tive management at Washington. So many blows
were to be struck simultaneously that the failure ie
time of any one of them jeopardised the success of
the whole. Gen. Rosecrans was urged on to strike
before he was ready, and narrowly escaped annihi-
lation ; and defeat at Vicksburg, which no one in
office at Washington considered either possible or
probable, has deranged all the plans for the capture
of Port Hudson. Gen. Halleck and Mr. Stanton
seem to be of that class of schemers and designers
who are popularly known as " too clever by half,"
and do not always remember that it is much easier
to plan battles than to win them.
Among minor items of news that-are of import-
ance the Messages of the Governors of States, de-
serve especial mention. These gentlemen are, one
after the other, delivering and publishing their
voluminous Messages to their Parliaments, Assem-
blies, and Houses of Representatives. What they
say is sometimes remarkable ; what they do not say
is often more remarkable still. Governor Curtis,
of Pennsylvania, claims that soldiers in the field
ought to have the same right of voting en all public
questions as private citizens, and declares the pur-
pose of Pennsylvania to permit no severance of the
Union unalterable. He does not, however, say a
single word on the President's Proclamation of
Emancipation. The Abolitionists are highly of-
fended at this omission, while the Democrats are
equally displeased. Governor Tod, of Ohio, who is
about to be superseded by Mr. Vallandigham, takes
occasion to inform the apparently benighted people
who live under his rule that " the question of man's
capacity for self-government is yet unsettled ;" that
the men of the South are both "wicked" and " bad;"
that they are engaged in a " gigantic effort" to over-
throw the beautiful and heavenly form of govern-
ment that existed at the period of the adjournment
of the Legislature of Ohio;" that "the effort has
not yet been quelled ;" that " no cause can justify
a State or any number of States in withdraw-
ing from the Union ;" and that "if slavery were
introduced into Ohio the fact would not give the
slightest pretext for armed resistance." He is
glad, however, to assure the people " that no
such attempt has been made or thought of by
the Federal officers now in power, as the authors
and leaders of the rebellion well know." He
also asserts that the bravery of the loyal citizens
of Ohio in September last " not only saved from
destruction the Queen City (Cincinnati), of which
we are all so proud, but the soil we all love so
much ; adding, in a sentence which, perhaps, is in-
telligible in Ohio, but not elsewhere, "that the
enemy, seeing this evidence of gallantry and power
were glad to abandon their hellish purpose and re-
tire, preventing an opportunity of testing whether
or not the old gun was still true to the steady and
manly hand of him who held the same." He states

that there were " only" eleven arbitrary and uncon-
stitutional arrests in Ohio, and thinks " that the
man who would complain of such acts, when his
neighbour on either side of him had for ever given
up his darling son, should be frowned on by all good
men." From this luminous reasoning it is to be
inferred that it is the opinion of this egregious Go-
vernor that if a man has no son to volunteer or be
draughted into the war he has no right to complain
of an illegal or unconstitutional act the Central or
Local Government may commit. In discussing the
question of banking and currency, Mr. Tod takes
occasion to affirm " that bankers cannot make money
by purchasing coin at 30 per cent. premium and sel-

ling it at a half per cent.”—a discovery that a man
need not be Governor of Ohio or Barataria to stumble
upon. Mr. Tod carefully abstains from informing
the peope of Ohio whether he approves or disap-
proves the President's Proclamation of Emancipa-
tion, treating it as a matter of no account. In the
Border States, as was to be expected, the Governors
are not so mealy-mouthed. Governor Burton, of
Delaware, is of opinion that the war has been
caused by the " fanatical madness of the " North

quite as much as by the folly of the south ;" and
knowing more of the question of slavery, from the
fact that Delaware is a slave State, than Governor
Tod can be supposed to know, he denounces the
l
President's incentive to servile war as one thatnd i twi o n
place the country in a more perilous
than ever, and prevent the restoration of. thceoUnion.
Governor Robinson, of Kentucky, is still more em-
phatic. In his closely rseatastoenped and eloquent Mes-
sper that the new
sage—by far the able he
d;sclaims, on the pirt of
year has produced
Kentucky, all
participation in the guilt of the blood
that has been shed. From the beginning the voice
of Kentucky was for conciliation and reunion. In
every conceivable mode in which that voice could
find utterance she was heard begging and imploring
for peace. Through her own Legislature, through
her representatives in Congress, through a special
delegation to Washington, through the Border
States' Convention, and through the mouth of her
distinguished statesman and patriot, Mr. Critten-
den, her cry was for peace, compromise, an 1 a re-
storation of the Union on terms which should pre-
vent quarrels both now and hereafter. As strongly
attached to the Union as ever she was, Kentucky
declares herself against the unconstitutional acts of
the President and his Administration ; protests
against the new and despotic doctrine that military
necessity, defined by a single individual, is not to be
measured by constitutional limits; and denounces
the Proclamation of Emancipation as not only un-
just, illegal, unconstitutional, and uncalled for, but

as one from which nothing but evil can floi4tagfil'is-PE R
Southern States, where it wickedly inc"
war ; and as one which the Border Stat.
tucky more especially, will unequive
The Governor believes that the majarit,
of all the States are as heartily,oppos,
tionism as to Secessionism.; that they are
aroused to a sense of the danger that threaten,irks
constitutional liberties; and that they will in good
time come to the rescue. Until that day, Which he
asserts to be near at hand, the people of it:entucky
will maintain their prerious position, "andstand tike
a massive wall between exasperated sections,"
protesting against the President's Proclamation,
and reaffirming the great principles of American
liberty, both State and national, which declare that:
!be question of Slavery is one for the local States.:
',lone, and with the settlement or management of
which in any shape or way the Federal Govern-
ment has not the smallest right to interfere. Go-
vernor Andrew, of Massachusetts, who so loves the
negro that on "Thanksgiving-day" he accepted on
invitation to (line with a black man employed 'asaa
messenger in the State-house, and took his Aide-cis-
Camp in full costume to grace the party, is of obursek:
in favour of the President's Proclamation, servile
war included. He asserts that the alumni of all the
Colleges of Massachusetts so thoroughly approve
the war that Harvard College sent 430 of her gra-
duates and undergraduates, Amherst Coliege 169,
and Williams College 111, to defend the Union on
the battlefield; but he says nothing of the 900,000
soldiers who he promised should swarm southwards
from New England to fight the rebels as soon as the
President should decree the emancipation of the
slaves. Perhaps, however, Mr. Andrew is of opinion
that the real proclamation is yet to come, and that
the emancipation, immediate and unconditional, of
all slaves, whether they belong to rebels or to true
men, is requisite before the imagination of the youth
of New England can be excited to the fighting
point. However this may be, Massachusetts, so far
trom fulfilling the promise of her Govern:-r, has
sent but 60,000 men to tie war, and to raise these
was compelled :to offer higher bounties than any
other State.

Congress has commenced the work of redeeming
negroes from bondage by giving irredeemable bonds
of the United States' Government in exchange
for them ; and to this end has voted the sum
of 10,000,000 dollars for emancipating the slaves
of loyal owners in Missouri. But as the aims re-
mains unpaid, as widows and orphans are starving
for want of the pensions owing to them, and of the
arrears of bounty money due to their slain protec-
tors, and as, moreover, the State of Missouri itself is
in partial occupation of a Confederate army, it seems
somewhat premature in Congress to devote any
money for emancipation until more favourable times,
When the country has the funds to spare, when the
loyal slaveowners offer to emancipate, when, too,
more pressing demands of the army shall have been
supplied, when peace shall have been restored, and
when New England and the Western States shall
consent to receive within their borders the emigrant
negroes who may fly from their Southern masters,
and shall not only employ them if able to work, but
feed them on the public bounty if they are aged, help-
less, and infirm, it will be quite time enough to free
the negroes of Missouri. But people's notions of
arithmetic begin to grow so confused by the illimit-
able issues of paper money, based upon the national
pride quite as much as upon the national credit, that
it is scarcely to be wondered at, though very much
to be deplored, that Senators and Members of the
House of Representatives-should talk as glibly of 10
millions of dollars as their fathers would have done
of a fiftieth part of the sum. Millions and billions
are all the same to the men of the mental calibre of
Mr. Thaddeus Stevens and the majority of both
Houses of Congress. Their prodigality and their
ignorance are alike stupendous; and although
Governor Andrew, who shares their opinions and
theories, thinks that "in a few brief years" the
national debt incurred by the war and the who!e
cost of the manumission of the slaves will ho paid
off, there is scarcely a man out of Congress or the
pulpit who believes as much, or who does not begin
in waking dreams to behold far off the apparition
of a gigantic sponge, huge as the debt, wielded by

the hand of a sterner necessity than has ever yet
confronted the nation. The question of the legality
of the debt has slready been raised, and when 'lvaco
comes—as come it must, sooner or later—and the
fierce hatreds of the war shall have given plc to
another, and perhaps more troublesome set of ani-
mosities which have their root, nut in the heart,
but in the pocket, it may be found a question even
more insoluble than that of negro slavery. Com-
mercial morality is not at its highest flow in this
country. Men are soon down and soon up. Elas-
ticity of mind and hopefulness are the national cha-
racteristics. Bankruptcy has few terrors to people
who can turn their hands to anything, and who, if
they cannot be senatcrs and judges, are content to
be keepers of lighthouses, to draw liquor in large
beer saloons, or to open oysters in California. Tra-
ders are not so thoroughly ruined by a failure here
as elsewhere. The people bethink themselves that
if the awful figures are allowed to remain as the
solvent expression of a real debt the Federal States
will be the most heavily taxed people in the world,
and that the debt will effectually deter from their
shores the labouring immigration of Europe, which
sought America to avoid both taxation and des-
potism, and which is not likely to flow into it to
face both those evils. The question is cropping out
rapidly above the rank soil of the war, and will
grow as rapidly as all other questions do in this
1 country, perhaps even as rapidly as the debt itself.

A MARTYR.—On the Kalends of January, in
the year 404, a remarkable incident occurred in the
Colosseum on the occasion of a gladiatorial show, which is
recorded by Theodoret and Caesiodorus. While, in the pro
Bence of an immense crowd of spectators, the gladiators
were fighting in the arena, a monkish figure, clothed in the
dress of his order, was suddenly seen to rush into the midst
of the combatants, and with loud prayer and excited gesture
endeavour to separate them. This was an Eastern monk,
named Telemachus or Almachius (for such is the chance of
fame, that his name is not accurately recorded), who had
travelled from the East with the express design of bearing'
his testimony against these unchristian games, and sacri-
ficing his life, if necessary, to obtain their abolition. The
Praetor Alybius, however, who was passionately attached
to them, indignant at the interruption, and excited by the
wild cries of the audience, instantly ordered the gladiators
to cut the intruder down, and Telemachus paid the forfeit
of his life for his heroic courage. But the crown and the
palm of martyrdom were given him, and he was not only
raised to a place in the calendar among the saints, but ac-
complished in measure the great object for which he had
sacrificed himself; for, struck with the grandeur and jueL-
nese of the courageous protest which he had sealed with
blood, the Emperor Honorius abolished the gladiatorialh
in the Colosseum against another g s
games, and from that time forward no giladdiiaatotorr.laßs
of6oaughati
Roma, by William W. Story-
A __
VICToRY. —News of a success
gained Ci
by c
tAhseslCAiNreassians over a garrison of R
Rus-
sians at Stanitsa in the Bas-Bakan, is conveyed by the
following letter of the 4th from Redout Kale :—We have
s :a ,
who
i of
ahno. the
descended
Thede f
aedatvao
nf f
advantage
received fullb ytan confirmatory7,i(eao,inm otuhnetaacEicnoaeus E
mountaineers,
twithaßeussMgiagneinsseekdast schigh defile, taking the enemy by surprise.
Advancing on the line of the Adagoun, they succeeded in
storming the fort of Georgiewski, which was held by the
6th battalion of the Kuban Cossacks, and 200 other troops
under the command of Colonel Gorhatko. The whole gar-
rison was put to the sword, a large quantity of munitions
and four pieces of field artillery were taken, and the fort
itself was razed to the ground. The entire line of the com-
munication in the province of Huber, had been completely
interr4ted for the Russians. The latter have been obliged
to erect another fortified post between Laba and Belais, to
serve as a sufficient protection for the road to Stanitsa.
The Russian detachment sent against the Shapsougs, in
order to (hive them back from the new military
cordon from Constantinowski, passing along the
river Pschisch to Knanskaia, have been much harassed
by the enemy. In a late skirmish the Russian suffered
heavy loss, the 19th battalion of rifles being almost entirely
cut off. Driven back on Koschkho, the latter were again
attack-d iu the Keschakhedetchoug, where they lost a
number of men and many officers. The aspect of atfAirs
has, in fact, become so grave that the Czar has appointed
his brother, the Grand Duke Michael, to the command of
the Caucasus; and it is thought here that the lattex will at
once commence the military reorganisation of the dis'rict,
and the laying out of a number of military roads. There
is no doubt that even in the districts which are considered
effectually subdued, the population still cherish their old
bitter feeling of hatred against the Russians—so intensely,
lindeed, as do the fighting mountaineers themselves. In
fact, whatever may be said to the contrary, the " conquest"
of the country is as far off now as it was years before
Schatayl was betrayed.

ROYAL ENGLISH OPERA, COVENT-
GARDEN.
Under the Management ut Miss Louisa Pync and Mr. W.
Harrison. Sole Lessees.
r THIS EVENING, SATANELLA : Misses Sara Dobson,
Thirlwall, and Susan Pyne H ; Mes
allsrs. W. Pay Wei
e,ss,and George
J. Rouse,
A. St. Albyn, Corti. C. Ly, W. H. Payn
rerren

Conductor—Mr. A. Mellon.
After whlch, the an Grd Comic Chris tmas Pantomime, en-
titled HARLEQUIN BEAUTY AN') THE BEAST.
Doors open at halt-past 6—Commence at 7.

rr HE ATR E-R OYA L. DRURY-LANE.-
Lessee and Manager, Mr. Edmund Falconer.
THIS EVENING, the Comic Drama of THE NEST OF

After
HOwhiESch, the Grand Pantomime of LITTL GO 9DY
TWOS

Commence at 7.

THEAT RE-ROY A HAY MARKET.
Lessee, Mr. J. B. Buckstone.
THIS EVENING, at Seven o'clock, will be performed
OUR AMERICAN COUSIN. Asa Trenchard, Mr. Buck-
stone 4 Lord Dundreary, Mr. Sothern.
After which, a new and original Extravaganza, entitled
.IgASSELAS, PRINCE OF ABYSSINIA ; or, The Happy
Rasselas, Miss Louise Keeley.
Concluding with OUR MARY ANNE.

THEATRE-ROYAL LYCEUM OPEN, under
the Sole Management of Mr. FECHTER.
THIS EVENING. Jan. 30, to commence with an Original
GEetch, entitled A SUDDEN ATTACK. Messrs. Shore,
arden, H. Widdicomb, Miss Henrade, and Mrs. Lee.
After which, at a Quarter to Eight, a New Romantic
Drama, in Three Acts, and Pr3logue, entitled THE
DUKE'S MOTTO, by Paul Feval and John Brougham.
The principal character will be sustained by Mr. Fechter,
ounported by Messrs. G. Vining, J. Brougham, H. Widdi
combe, W. Brlntyre, F. Charles, Garden, Raymond, H.
Butler, Dawson ; Misses Carlotta Leclercq, Kate Terry, B.
Lavenue, and Elsworthy.
Mr. Phelps and Mr. W. Montgomery are engaged, and will
hortly appear.
Doors open at half-put Six, performance to commence
at Seven. Private Boxes, 22 12s. 6d., and £2 25..
Upper
es
psper
registered. Stalls, Os. 6d. ; Dress Circle ,_5
4; ss Circle,
Circle, 4s. 6d. Prices at doors—stails, 8 , s. ;
a No half-price. Box-
Upper Circle, 4s. ; Pit, 2s. ; GallerY•.s.
Office open daily from 11 till 5.
The üblic are entreated to
take notice that no charge is made to the occupants of boxes,
boa places, or stalls, either for play bills or for the safe keep:
ing of hats and cloaks ; and that the attendants in all parts
Of the hutse are forbidden to receive any gratuities whatever
StageMagager, Mr. G. Vining. Acting-Manager, Mr. H.
Barnett.

ROYAL PRINCESS'S THEATRE.
-;see and Manager, iTr Lindus.
THIS EVENING, LAW v. LOVE : Miss M. Oliver.
Followed by ONE GOOD TURN DESERVES AN-
OTHER. Mr. R. Roxby and Miss Amy Sedgwick.
After which, the New Grand CHRISTMAS PANTOMIME,
" RIQUET WITH THE TUFT ; or, Harlequin and Mother
Shipton." Mr. G. Belmore, Mr. C. Seyton, Misses Gray and
Hudspeth, Mr. Milano, Mr. R. Power, Miss A. Collinson, and
Salford.

NEW THEATRE-ROYAL, ADELPHL-
Sole Proprietor and Manager, Mr. B. Webster.
THIS EVENING, THE LI iTLE THE .SURE. Mr
Billington, Mr. R. Phillips, and Miss Marie Wilton.
After which, A TICKET OF LEAVE : Messrs. J. L.Toole,
r, Bedford, and Mrs. Bil lingto DE BARNWELL
n.
To include with " GEORGE :
OT, Harlequin Folly in theßealms of
rs. FanJ." Miss WP. lied:oolgar
Miss K. Kelly, Miss Seaman ;
MesscyL. Toole,
lord, S-kephenson, C. J. Smith. Harlequin, Mr. John Lauri,
Columbine, Miss Caroline Adams CLown, Mr. W. Hildyard
rantaloon, Mr. J. PAulo. The celebrated Arthur an(
Bertrand.

Commence at 7.

The Weather.—Sun Office, Jan.:3o, 1863.

THERMOMETER.
Highest since Noon yesterday. 5l
Lowest during the night
This day at Noon 47
Barometer-29.60.
fresh and squally, with dull close weather.
Trind---15.-W.;
-------------

HIGII WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE.
THIS DAY: ;Morning, 10h. 41m.—Afternoon, 1111.45 m.
To-xonuow.-Morning, 12h. 3m.—Afternoon, h. m.

(hi;
att
4... um

LONDON, FRIDAY, JANUARY 30, 1863,

England's opinion upon Slavery has long since
been placed beyond the reaeh of misapprehension.
It has been signalised as no natlion, before or since,.
ever signalised the depth of its convictions in
regard to a great principle. Of the eternal devo-
tion of this country to the cause of Negro Enianci-
pation, the country itself afforded to the world, not
many years since, a material guarantee, singularly
notable in its imperial magnificence. History has
recorded the fact, in undying words, in the annals
which tell of that munificent vote of 20,000,000 I
It is beyond the power of any one£, therefore, to
deprive the British Empire, to deprive the race of
Englishmen of that one particular glory and dis-
tinction—namely that, of abhorring from their in-
most heart and soul the accursed institution of
Slavery. This ineradicable abhorrence of Slavery
is, in a manner, as it were, among our birth-rights.
It is with us like a populltars cherished by persons instinct. It is peculiarof
to no political party. i
every religious belief. It seems to us like an integral
part of our Comstitution. If one might so express
our conviction uperi., this point without profanity, it
seems almost among the corollaries of Christianity.
So resplendently has England's hatred of slavery
been attested, so signally have Englishmen
evidenced in the sight of the whole world
their aspiration to forward in every direction
the diffusion of the spirit of Emancipation, that a
deliberate attempt to vindicate the national loyalty
to the interests of Freedom, so far as it affects the
poor African, it almost partakes of the nature of the
is gilding refined gold—painting
ridiculous. If,
the lily--adding a perfume to the violet : doing
superfluous, what is absolutely
what is wholly
matter of superefogation. Under ordinary circum-
stances, at any rate, it would be so beyond any doubt.
Even when insinuations are thrown out insidiously
to the effect that there is a diminution in the
Yearning of the people of this country to en-
sure, whenever or wherever it might be pos-
sible, the liberation of the Black—a demon-
stration deliberately and formally designed to
repudiate that charge—appears to us, alto-
gether, a proceeding of very questionable taste.
Insinuations of that flagrant and preposterous kind
ought rather, as it seems to us, to be laughed utterly
to scorn. England, in this matter, requires no vin-
dication. Her love of Freedom is beyond all ques-
COD, is beyond all dispute. Instead of falling off
in any way amongst us, it grows with our growth
And strengthens with our strength. If ever the
inhabitants of these islands can be excited to en-
thusiasm, it is by some conspicuous or unlooked-for
whether of Art, or of Letters, or of Ora-
reference,
of Slavery. At every touch of
Cory, to the theme
b true genius of any kind,
that thrilling chord y
the phlegmatic calm of the islander disappears.
Oratory never won a more brilliant or n
when
than
more
instantaneous victory over its hearers th
Cr/IRAN, carried away by the "mighty theme,"
uttered his ever-afterwards famous panegyric upon
she Genius of Universal Emancipation." No
marble product of the sculptor's chisel has in our
time secured to itself a more rapidly evidenced, or
a more widely diffused tribute of admiration (the
admiration at once of love and pity) than that
masterpiece from Ilium POWER'S hands, the beau-
tiful form of the Greek Slave. Conspicuous as an
immense literary success here in England—con-
apicnous, as such, even when CHARLES DICKENS
was, as he still is (and long may he continue to re-
at the noonday of the very pride and
Main so I)
glory of his delightful reputation—conspicuous
here in England, even with DICKENS as a
contemporary, was the triumph achieved by
rs. HARRIET BEECHER STOWE up
M on the publica-
Tom's Cabin!"
tion of one little story-book, " Uncle
And this agaia because of what CURRAN grandly
and modestly called, as we have said, "the mighty
reclting the appli-
theme"—so calling it when dep
cation to iraself of the plaudits woo by
his own
eloquence ! "Uncle Tom's Cabin" because of that
potent theme, running through shoals of editions,
littering every bookstall,
being piled upon the coun-
ters of every librarian,
appearing at every price, in
every shape, illustrated and un-illustr,zted, cheap
and costly in its getting up. And this, we reixat,
simply because the subject of the tale that was then
told came so near to the hearts, and consciences?

and affections, and the cherished convictions of let- i
tered Englishmen. No—the devotion of England to
the interests of the Negro race, the earnest solidi-
tude of Englishmen for its liberation from slavery
in all parts of the globe, is a truth visible to the
world -at large as the light at noonday. The
character of England, and of Englishmen in this

matter needs—again and again we say it—no yin-

dication whatsoever.

The immense meeting which took place
last evening in Exeter Hall, to this very end, ap-
pears to us, consequently, to the very last degree
superfluous. It was so egregiously superfluous, in
truth, that it virtually amounted to a display—upon
an immense scale, and fcr that reason all the more
painfully—of wretchedly bad taste. It was as
glaringly in bad taste and as wholly a matter
of supererogation, as, let us say, a studied vindi-
cation of Lord NELSON'S bravery would have been
at some public banquet, in his own presence
and hearing, upon the occasion of pro-
posing the toast of the Hero's Health. It was worse
than in bad taste—we still maintain it—it was
simply ridiculous. According to the philosophy of
the originators and promoters of yesterday's meet-
ing in Exeter Hall, elaborate treatises ought
with all speed to be written to prove that
RUBENS was a colourist, that MOZART had
a sense of harmony, that VITRUVIUS had
an eye to proportion, and that EUCLID had
just some glimmering knowledge of the rudiments
of geometry. From first to last, we repeat—as a
vindication of the loyalty of Englishmen to the
cause of Emancipation—it was nothing less than a
ludicrous mistake. That a keen witted, large hearted,
earnest, thinking man like Mr. THOMAS HUGHES,
the delightful author of a delightful book like " Tom
Brown's School-days"—that a man so largely gifted
with common sense, as well as with other gifts, far
more common, many of them, than that sense so
called upon the principle of luaus a non lueendo—
that Mr. HUGHES, of all men, should have lent him-
self to a movement of this really most uncalled-for
character, just simply passes the comprehension of
some among his heartiest admirers. There he was,
however, last night, marching at the head of a
group of " Vindicators" across that Coventry of
the metropolis, the Platform of Exeter Hall ! And
to what purpose ? To vindicate the loyalty of
Englishmen to the interest of Negro Emancipation
—How ? By endeavouring to identify our ab-
horrence of slavery with an enthusiasm for Mr.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S Proclamation! A Proclama-
tion that hundreds of thousands of Englishmen—
loathing Slavery in their heart of hearts—have
read with feelings of dismay and of unaffected grief!
Recognizing in it an act that if but done earlier
and otherwise would doubtless have been as puissant
in its influence as it must then have proved beneficent
in its results—an act that done now and after this
hesitating fashion would probably be most disastrous
in its consequences as a signal for a servile war
were it not intrinsically so utterly powerless
whether for good or for evil. No, England ab-
hors slavery, but not with the half abhorrence of
the American PRESIDENT. Englishmen yearn
ardently to promote the wider and wider spread
of Negro Emancipation, bat not by pointing to
the sharpened dagger and the ignited brand, not
by hinting a blow, or hesitating a stab!

Audi aileron partemis a time-honoured maxim
and in obedience to its authority we are willing to
give the Rev. Mr. GIBSON a fair hearing in his
somewhat acrimonious opposition to the general
approval expressed of Sir WALTER CROFTON and
the Irish Convict system.* There is, as wenn know,
no safety in extremes, and it is quite as probable
that the state of affairs in Ireland may have been
overrated, as it is that undue blame has been
attached to the painstaking and laborious
director of our convict prisons. It would not be
fair to suppose that were Sir WALTER CROFTON
established in authority here, he could with one
wave of a harlequin's wand cause our criminal po-
pulation to disappear, and a band of honest men to
spring up in their place ; neither is it just to blame
our English authorities too severely if such a de-
sirable transformation has not taken place under
their management. Still the question remains—ls
the present system the best calculated to insure the
safety of the public, and promote the reformation of
the offender ? The answer is unhappily found in
the notorious insecurity of life and property, and
the universal dissatisfaction of our heavily-taxed
community. Without advocating a bou/erersement
of all present arrangements which, in dealing with
such a class, might occasion great risks, we do
think that there is urgent need of considerable alte-
rations and increased stringency in enforcing the
rules. Mr. GIBSON is himself a prison chaplain
and has been so for the seven years during which
the new system has been in force, and must there-
fore be allowed to speak with some authority. He
condemns the intermediate prisons and police super-
vision in toto, but it is not very clear upon what
grounds. He complains that the men at Lusk do not
afford a fair sample of the convicts; but he forgets
that Sir W, CROFTON expressly states that only
the best are admitted to Lusk. He further remarks
that those employed at the intermediate stations
might as well be discharged altogether, and cen-
sures Sir W. CROFTON'S wish to "put them in the
way of temptation." If we understand him rightly,
however, Sir WALTER CROFTON referred only to the
temptations incidental to liberty, and not to any
special dangers being placed in the convict's way.
With regard to the police supervision, it has doubt-
Less many painful and invidious features, still it is

difficult to see how the_ ticket-of-leave system can

be anything but a mockery without it. If no
check is placed upon him, what is to prevent the
discharged convict from changing his name and
locality, and at once betaking himself to his old
trade. A " ticket-of-leave" is with us too often
synonymous with a total discharge. It is true
that if tried for a second offence the previous mis-
conduct may weigh against him, but that Sir
WALTER CROFTON was right in his remark that
the conditions on the back of the ticket are never
enforced in England is proved by the recent decla-
rations of a Judge on thein ebnenccho,nwvihetoedd—ecllaertedohuet
had frequently seen
—reconvicted for a woofrt time, and again dis-
cehxaprirgeedd. beTfohruesthfoertetrieo
offt heenicresfirstth
esepnutennischemheandt
receivedprop proper
fowra so
al ees.s
Andthan thet
h ss e nl
etaednsc
us to
ou thought p rpoopi
point
which it is highly important should be immediately
!hared in our present management, and in which
an improvement can happily be carried into effect
without any startling change. We do not propose
the total abolition of the ticket of leave system, but
let all sentences remain tis fixed by tho judge, de-
pendent only upon the prisoner's good conduct.
We are aware that such is nominally the case
at present, but we apprehend that it is very
seldom, if under any circumstances, that a sen-
, tence of lb or 20 years is carried into effect. If
the granting of tickets of leave were less a matter
of course—if the prisoner felt that, without ex-
ceptional good conduct on his part, his term of
imprisonment would not be shortened by a day—
I would be productive of
the results, we

* Irish Convict Befoul'. Py an Irish Prison Chaplain.
M,Glashan and Gill, Dublin.