The Sun.
London, England, 1863-10-06 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS,

TIMES.—A recovery of 2or 3 per cent. in the
quotations of the Confederate Loan, and a revival of
the rumours respecting the recognition of the South
by France, are the natural consequences of the
last news from America. A defeat in Tennessee, a
check in Texas, a pause, to say the least, in the
siege of Charleston, and the suspension of the
Habeas Corpus Act in the North, are more than
enough to disturb the money-market on both sides
of the Atlantic. Such fluctuations do not always
represent the sober calculations of far-sighted men,
but the efforts of speculators to make a profit by the
hopes and fears of more nervous capitalists. The
next mail may possibly bring intelligence of a Fe-
deral victory, and then the " movement" will be
reversed. in the meantime, however, there is one
circumstance favourable to the Confederate cause
which does not depend for its importance on these
oscillations in the fortunes of war. The position of
France in Mexico, and the conditional acceptance of
the Crown by the Archduke Maximilian, amount to
something more than a diversion in favour of the
South, inasmuch as they are a forcible and practi-
cal protest against the idea of one dominant Repub-
lic on the North American Continent. If an inde-
pendent Monarchy be established in Mexico, the
motive for subjugating the Confederate States is
sensibly weakened, and who can say but that the
princip.e of a balance of power may be borrowed
from Europe, and introduced into the New World !
At all events, the growing antagonism between the
interests of the Federal States and those of France,
coincident with fresh successes of the Southern
armies, will afford a fair opportunity of testing
the charitable estimate of our policy that seems
to be accepted by the war party in America.
According to the organs of this party, the
blindest self-interest gaverns alternately with the
basest cowardice the conduct of the British
Government. When they thought they could bully
the United States with impunity they made no
secret of their Southern proclivities ; when they
heard that Vicksburg had fallen, that Lee had re-
treated, and that Charleston was threatened, they
laid an embargo on the steam rams at Birkenhead,
and gave Mr. Mason the cold shoulder. It remains
to be seen, therefore, whether the tidings which
sent up gold to 42 prem. at New York will produce
a corresponding effect on the language of Earl Rus-
sell and the public opinion of England ; whether
Lord Wharncliffe and his friends will be allowed to
have their own way, and Mr. Mason invited to
come back; and, if nothing of this kind happens,
what new unworthy motive wills rib
attributed to
us by our American critics. It is, perhaps, unknown
to these gentlemen, but it is a fact, that our country-
men resident in the Southern States are just now
loud in their indignation against the English Go•
vernment for truckling as they allege, to the Cabinet
of Washington. Their grievance is that their pro-
perty is not respected by the invading Federals, but
seized or destroyed with as little scruple as though
it belonged to Confederate owners, and that Lord
Russell has omitted to exact, or even to demand,
any reparation for it. The hardship of their position
has been brought home to them still more painfully
by the result of an application made by certain
British capitalists on their own behalf to the State
Department at Richmond. What they requested
was that the Confederate Government should un-
dertake to guarantee cotton purchased by British
subjects, and stored in the interior of the country,
against the risk of destruction by order of the
Confederate commanders to prevent its falling into
the hands of the enemy. Mr. Benjamin answered,
in effect, that he could not consent to involve his
Government in any such responsibility, unless he
received the corresponding assurance that restitu-
tion would be rigorously enforced from the Federal
Government by that of Great Britain if the
cotton should be destroyed or confiscated by the
Northern Generals. Moreover, he astutely ex-
plained that it would not be enough for the
captors to reimburse to the neutral proprietors
the value of the cotton at the time and place of
seizure,inasmuch as that value might be no more
than a fifth of its worth iu the United States, so
that they might profit to the extent of 400 per cent.
by the act of spoliation. Unless, therefore, the
enemy could be effectually bound over to lea%e such
stores of cotton untouched, he could not pledge the
Confederacy to idemnify their owners against its
destruction by Southern hands for military reasons.
We cannot be surprised that this reply—coupled
with the fact that no interference on their behalf
had been promised by ',the British Government,
though a representation was made so long ago as
August, 1862—should have excited a good deal of
irritation among English merchants in the South.
Before, however, we condemn Lord Russell for not
making a peremptory demand that would probably
have been resisted, it is right that we should advert
to one or two material points which the parties in-
terested may not have sufficiently considered. In
the first place, it is clear from a letter of Mr. Ben-
jamin to Mr,Mason that the operations contemplated