The Sun.
London, England, 1863-12-16 00:00:00

one of his late addresses, which is to walk among
the pigmy States of the old world "as an elephant
treads among mice."

As a symptom of the disposition on the part of
the South to relent we may take their slackened
energies in deeds of guerilla warfare. Except im-
mediately on the skirts of the large armies, where
bands of desperadoes prowl about, less impelled by
motives of political partisanship than by love of
plunder, and consisting, indeed, in many instances of
the worst kind of deserters, the riff-raff from
the troops on either side, the soldiers of for-
tune who infested the Border States and the
banks of the Mississippi have either joined the
larger corps still holding their own in West
Louisiana and Texas, or have betaken themselves
to peaceful avocations and to a great extent dis-
appeared from the scenes of their wonted exploits.
Frequent instances of firing upon and burning of
steamers on the IVlississippi are still reported, some
of them attended with loss of life, and signalised
by tragic, heartrending incidents. But it is not by
such feats that a cause can be hallowed even in the
hearts of its stanchest supporters ; indeed, means of ,
such description are only calculated to bring any
cause into discredit, and to wean the humane and
the generous from it. The only guerilla chief who
still plays a very important part in the episodical
portion of the great drama of the war is Moseby, a
gentlemanly officer, whose conduct wins some re-
spect even from the adversaries at whose expense
his and gallantry are exercised. No
e
activity,
was of late created in this country
by h
i
ell-contrived and fortunate escape of Mor-
gan and six of his officers from their place of con-
finement at Columbus, in Ohio—an escape so mar-
vellous, after the warning given of his intentions
by the plots detected two or three weeks ago, that
it is impossible to suppose it could be effected with-
out connivance on the part of some of the gaolers.
Morgan and his fellow-prisoners, by the last ac-
counts, have reached Toronto in safety. Whether
they will tarry in the land of exile or revisit the
theatre of their former bold raids may in a great
measure depend, on the general vicissitudes of the
war.

On the whole, I conclude that the South seems
to exhibit signs of weariness and despondency, and
peace, if it were offered on plausible terms, might
be hailed as a providential deliverance. Such being,
as I conceive, the state of men's minds in the South,
it may be worth while to inquire what effects, on
the other hand, the prospects of approaching peace
would have upon the Northerners.

The first impression made among these North-
erners by the glad tidings of Grant's "stunning
and decisive victory," towards the end of last week,
was followed by a second sensation by no means of
a pleasurable nature. The Americans were panic-
struck at their too easy victory. " What!" they
said, '• can the war come so suddenly and so speedily
to an end ?" Was the valour of the Union troops
and the skill or luck of their Generals so soon to
bring about the catastrophe of a drama the first acts
of which drew out to such dreary lengths ? Can a
nation have too much wind astern, or are we to be-
lieve that "it is indeed a good wind that blows
nobody ill ?"

In the first place, as I have often told yon before,
the Black Republicans and Abolitionists, whose
ranks, as you are also aware, have been wonderfully
swelling of late, always wished for an indefinite
prolongation of hostilities. They had the great
mission to accomplish ; their work of emancipation,
implying the utter desolation, disorganisation, and
disfranchisement of the South, and requiring, there-
fore, a long, desperate, envenomed contest. Tne
rank and file of these worthies did no worse than
openly and loudly deprecate peace, but their leaders
especially those who had a finger in the Adminis-
tration pie, more actively put it cff by thwarting
the Efforts of the F deral Generals, hampering their
movements if they were meek and submissive, and
plotting their recal if they showed themselves stub-
born and self-willed. For them speedy peace meant
compromise with the Southerners, a respite granted
to slavery, however within reduced limits and for
but a short lease of existence ; it meant reintegra-
tion of the Southern States to their former rights,
and the strengthening of their Democratic oppo-
nents by the almost unanimous vote of rehabilitated
rebeldom,

Yet the greatest horror of a too ready subjugation
or of a spontaneous surrender of the South, at this
present crisis, was not merely the result of party
considerations, nor was it manifesting itself merely
imong the out-and-out abolitionists. The peace
panic spread among all ranks and circles ; it had its
ground on mere monetary considerations. Suppose
the sword to be laid aside at Christmas, or even at
Midsummer next, people asked, what would become
of the financial condition of the country ? Would not
the expected crash, the much redoubted deluge, itu.
mediately ensue ? Hitherto, short-sighted people
grounded their fears of a financial shock upon the
apprehension of the probable effects of a protracted
struggle and of the reckless expenditure with which
it was carried on. The war, by its long duration,
they thought, was sure to ruin the country ; it was
the last regiment, the last monitor, the last feather.
weight that would bresk the camel's back. But of
late shrewd observers were more inclined to con-
clude that the war would feed itself, that the people
would go on from delusion to delusion, that the bub-
ble would float on larger and larger, brighter and
brighter, and would only burst at the peace. The
social machine had received from the war a mo-
mentum which would only stop with the war itself.
And now people fancied the war had come, or
threateneck to come, to a standstill, in so unforeseen
a manner as to baffle the anticipations of the most
sanguine Copperhead. The game which had hitherto
recklessly been played with mere counters must now
be settled in hard cash in good earnest. The calami-
ties that war had matured peace would reveal.
The seeds that had been sown in strife must be
reaped in reconciliation.
The moment the South succumbs or is brought
on its last legs, people reasoned, does away with
the necessity of three-fourths of the present arma-
ment. Half a million of men will be forced back on
the labour market, precisely as the demand for
labour must suddenly and inevitably diminish.
Wages fall, competition overleaps itself,consumption
ceases to keep pace with production. Agriculture,
manufactures, everything had been made subser-
vient to the furtherance of a work of destruction.
How long would it take before the springs of social
wellbeing could flow back into their wonted chan-
nels ; how loeg before the State machine slid back
into its ancient groves? Resumption of specie pay-
ment would be the first and immediate consequence
'of the close of hostilities. Government stock would
rise, but railway, mining, and all other stock would
l'im,„onlunktit•toZ?f all the work of the war nothing but the
Debt would remain, and the necessity for
a ertmili
into pcplenna' grinding taxation. The rich would fall
silent, romY, the poor would have to choose between
riot and at! feed starvation, and aimless unavailing
i.
All this Nem the
rbject of everybody's talk and
speculation soon
nteutrpeople recovered from the first
breathless excitetn
caused by the glowing de-
scriptions of Grant's
Portentous victories," To-day,
wyain, we are Warned a_
0 IS4I at the dangers of over-
confidence. The inaPorteen,e „
question, of Grant's success is
somewhat called in
intelligible reßelad's advance has
yet f titheet zuoyd .
hitherto led to not
out
ou ts, and Burnside
must not halloo before he is
backbone of the rebellion is not
broken.Teeieen
Even were the Southerners to be driven from the
field utterly, peace and order would
not soon r •
in the reconquered region. There would •
stla be a
necessity for a vast army to keep the Souther,
in awe ; Government would still be put to f
ormida.
ble expenses. The good time would not come all of
a sudden, nor, therefore, too quick a change in the
financial position of the country. The transition
from the present inflated currency to the normal
state of the money market would be gradual and
safe ; labour would have leisure to go back
from public employment to private enterprise.
Demand and supply would re-establish their
wonted level. The untilled, unlimited lands of
the West would have power to repair Eastern
broken fortunes. Happy young America, always
sure to fall on her feet, would recover from this as
she did recover from so many other crises.
With arguments like these people were fain to
console themselves or to reassure their neighbours.