The Sun.
London, England, 1862-10-24 00:00:00

llf any inferences can be drawn from the systema-
ptiocblliysibnegd obfy thThee tlevleagrr-office
are allowed to be
Gen. Braxton Bragg in Kentucky. The Federal
Buell has suffered a serious defellraasthtinhgetloinandGsenof
at
accounts do not claim a great victory, but hint, in
the most modest way, that a victory must have been
achieved. The facts that have oozed out point to
an opposite conclusion, and indicate pretty plainly
that Gen. Buell has been severely handled, and that
the Confederates have lost no ground in Kentucky.
Whatever the truth may be, it is certain that it will
not be divulged in time to reach Europe by the
steamer that carries this letter if it should be un-
favourable to the Federal cause. The general im-
pression is that the Confederates have gained a
signal advantage ; and this, added to the certain
intelligence that the reported Federal victory at
Corinth was not by any means so decisive as Gen.
Grant was fain to believe or glad to assert in his
official despatches, has created an uneasy feeling in
Wall-street. Gold has reached to-day the high
point of 29 per cent, premium ; and business men
are for the first time in the history of the war be-
ginning to doubt whether President Lincoln's " big.
job " may not be too " big" for the Northern Go-
vernment to accomplish, •
Pending the issues of battle in the field, the elec-
toral battle begins to rage bitterly in the State and
city of New York. The question to be decided be-
tween Mr. Seymour and Gen. Wadsworth, the rival
candidate for the office of Governor, is the whole
question of the war, and is as precise and simple as
it is momentous. Mr. Seymour represents the Con-
servative feeling of the country. He would rather
that there should have been no Secession. He
would prefer the re-establishment of the Union to its
permanent disruption ; but he looks upon Secession
and disunion as facts, not as theories, and is not
inclined, even for the sake of the Union, which he
loves, to imperil liberty, which lie loves still better.
He is of opinion if the Union can only be restored by
aid of a servile war, and the utter extermination of
the Southern people—men, women, and children, so
that no white person shall be left in the land but
the Northern exterminators to divide the planta-
tions among them, as the soldiers of William the
Conqueror did the broad acres of England,—it is
not worth the price to be paid for it. General
Wadsworth entertains different views. Like too
many of his countrymen in New York and New
England, he prefers the Union, one and indivisible,
to liberty, to law, to humanity, to the Constitution,
end to everything that Americans have hitherto
been taught to revere. No means to his end seem
barbarous enough to affright him and the party to
which he belongs,—imprisonment on bare suspicion,
the gallows, or the guillotine are the agencies which
his partisans recommended to secure the predomin-
ance of their ideas. New York has to decide by its
votes within the next 20 days which of the two
candidates it prefers. The decision will test the
fortune of the Government and the fate of the war.
If it be for Wadsworth, Mr. Lincoln—who is glid-
ing rapidly down an inclined plane that leads to
social convulsion, anarchy, and ruin—will receive
an impetus in his course towards destruction. If
it be for Seymour, common sense will have a chance
to be heard amid the hubbub of angry passions ;
and the President, who is naturally cautious and
conservative, will be strengthened to take a stand
against the encroachments of the revolutionary fac-
tion, that is fast driving him into unknown depths
of revolutionary madness.
Both parties are confident of success. General
Wadsworth's friends boast the more loudly of
the two ; and no wonder. Passion is always more
vituperative than reason, and those who are making
rapid fortunes out of the miseries of their country
are not likely to hold their tongues when quiet men
take measures to restore peace. But the quiet men,
especially when they have been drilled and schooled
in party warfare in less exciting times, have
methods of working that are not the less effective
for being little noticed. The Democratic party, as
becomes it, utters no threats. Its watchwords are
a The constitution and the law." By these it is con-
tteionnt,tsootstoasnidd.o
thel law,
sowpponents deride the Constitu-
tion,
favour of a despotism, but and are
a
renotyavowedly
despotism of
and terror. They are the true representatives in
the American Revolution of the Jacobins of France,
o n l
blood
and make no secret of the ruthless and sanguinary
modes they would employ, if they had the power,
to muzzle opposition and destroy their rivals. One
of them—the indiscreet Major-General Cassius Mar-
cellus Clay, ex-ambassador to St. Petersburg—stated
broadly the night before last at a public meeting in
Brooklyn, held to support the candidature of Gene-
ral Wadsworth, " that, so far from finding fault
with Abraham Lincoln for suspending the Habeas
Corpus by a dash of the pen, he rather found fault
with him for not suspending it by a rope round the
necks of traitors." A sympathising auditor inter-
rupted the flow of words by exclaiming, " We'll
hang them yet," to which Cassius rejoined, "Yes,
hangingoSfiraldthheerens,i Ytie uu t of such men as Seymour and Wood
would have saved thousands of lives," The same
voice replied, " That is so ;" and Cassius, waxing
rr
da
w aso b o
u
humorous, exclaimed, amid the laughter of his mob
Even Mr. Raymond, Speaker of the local Legisla-
t ui
ee , and
y exy Gv
party,of
hasaNn been car
d York,ohas
aa p
formerlyr
dp re oo
lvaerdi
nag r
thates resolution l nt
everyio a passed
eieoms,
sean it
aadnnwouldndets_sso
o ofs beeh i
rsssensible,
trueriibo lre philanthropy !"
, otrnaei
twhoo art2,a
shouldAt Wadsworthanotrheoe
or
rmcdreoaewt
crowded
do
for Seymour was a a,
meeting held on Wednesday, at the Cooper Insti-
Dtuitoek,inwsoitnh,
otnlinee
asaDmeemoobojraect,t,nothweaHn
nonit.raD-RaenpienlblSi:
can, said, " Sooner than see this Union severed, let
not only the institution (of slavery) perish whenever
and wherever it can be found, but let the habita-
tions that have known it perish with it and be
known no more for ever." The inhuman senti-
ment, which means the extermination of the
Southern people, if it means anything, was received
with three rounds of applause. The same speaker,
warming with his subject, said it was easy for the
aDemocraticnd t o
sentimentalise
o n indulgethe in
bean r
ties apo s
of d
the
e over s
com-
monlaw; but these, when invoked as a means
of conquering a rebellion, were as ridiculous as a
shtoi
lmow,nsfrheiondeot arrest
freedom
ofspaeneoeba,rtlhibqouratyke.ofCotnbee
homily on
moonshine
press, usurpation, tyranny, &c., were words easily
prated, and even parrots could be taught them."
This was bad enough to come from the lips of a pro-
fessed patriot and enemy of monarchy and aristo-
cracy ; but it was surpassed by the diabolical in-
sinuations and recommendations of the Hon. H. B.
Stanton on the same evening to another audience
convened for the same purpose. Though this gentle-
man was candid enough to admit " that he was not
sure, if the issue of Abraham Lincoln v. Jefferson
Davis were put to the city of New York, which of
the two the ballot-box would proclaim the victor."
He was not ashamed nor afraid to set the opinion
of half of New York and that of the whole civilised
world of Europe at defiance by recommending a St.
Domingo massacre of white men to end the war, if
it could not be ended otherwise. " How," he in-
s masters'ess of its application to the
in-
quired, "can we use the slaves in tliis war? 1 an-
swer, in two most effective modes—first, teach the
throats, and not to
cut their masters' crops." The audience remember-
ing the old story, "Do n.)t nail his ears to the
npeaginrpoe;,
annodt ttohecuntbvthinenirn
case in point, laughed loudly at the joke ; and
though the speaker went on to qualify and explain
that he only meant that the negroes should be taught
to work.for " Mr- Cash instead of Mr. Lash," he
returned, before he concluded his speech, to what
his audience must have supposed to be the real sen-
tinient of his heart. " I would," he said, amid loud