The Sun.
London, England, 1862-01-10 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, FRIDAY EVENING, JANUARY 10, 1862.

THE CIVIL WAR IN AIIIE.RICA

(From the Special Correspondent of the Times.)
WASHINGTON, DEC. 27.
THE SURRENDER OF MASON AND
SLIDELL.
Omitting all matters of detail till next post, I
hasten to announce that the Government of the
United States has acceded to the demands of Great
Britain and has consented to surrender Mr. Mason,
Mr. Slidell, and their secretaries. This morning
Mr. Seward sent to Lord Lyons a request that his
lordship would call at the State Department, and
in the interview which took place Mr. Seward
handed the British Minister an exceedingly volumi-
nious note, which will no doubt see the light some
day in England, and informed him at the same
time that the captives were at his lordship's dispo-
sal. Let us take this act as the expression of the
conviction in the minds of the American Govern-
ment that they were wrong in retaining their pri-
soners, and that the seizure was an outrage, nor let
us, till we know the nature of the despatch, attri-
bute any other motives to them than the desire to
do what is right. The effect in this country, when
it is known, will be exceedingly great, for such a
dish of humble pie cannot be taken into stomachs
which have been disordered by cocktail talking
without a great deal of nausea. Do not imagine
that the real intelligence and worth of the people
will disapprove the act. The men I allude to are
the writers in the "sensation" press, and the
bunkum orators, as well as the more violent
Abolitionists, who by insulting messages and in-
temperate pledges have bound themselves to oppoie
the concession, no matter how just it might prove
to be. Doubtless, Mr. Seward in the elaborate
despatch he has written will seek to show that
Great Britain has laid down some new principle
in this trausaction, and in swelling periods
will endeavour to demonstrate that by yielding the
prisoners the United States has gained some great
point for herself and the world in general from
Great Britain, which can never again take political
offenders from neutral ships. Let it be so. The case
is memorable enough and clear enough to serve as
a precedent. No one can doubt but that the rela-
tions of both countries would have been much more
satisfactory if the Government of Washington had
restored the prisoners as soon as it heard of the cap-
ture, and if all the irritating writing and speaking
to which we have been treated here, and the ex-
pense, anxiety, and sense of indignity to which we
were exposed in Great Britain, had been obviated.
I fear that the wrath to come will be greater than
anything yet experienced by us, and that a terrible
future is in store for Great Britain, at the indefinite
time when so many great things are to come to
pass. The Government here, which has thus far got
over its external dangers, will now have to face a
tremendous ordeal. The sense of justice or right or
even necessity cannot prevail over the cherished
love of doing what they like among the masses.
The Union can get more than half a million of melt
to fight for her, at a considerable expense, it is true,
but moved in the main, let us admit, by love for the
Union ; but she could, I am assured, raise a million
to fight against England. That is, the hate of
Great Britain is at least twice as strong as the love
of the Union among many millions of Americans.
They will be disappointed this time. If Mason and
Slidell be surrendered without any extravagant
threats in the press, or without any indig-
nation meetings, we may hope that friendly re-
lations will be preserved for years to come, as
it will be a token that in a crisis the sound
sense, patriotism, and desire to do what is
demanded by justice and right predominate in the
United States over the violence of popular passion.
Let us stand by and see if it will be so, and let us
be thankful meantime that we are spared the war
which would have been forced on us in vindication
of our honour had the Government here been deaf
to the voice of reason. The secret of the Govern-
ment has been well kept. Mr. Seward must have
enjoyed the pleasure of tantalising Mr. Sumner and
the other senators and politicians who thought to
worm out his secret, for he is fond of a joke, and
could not have been indifferent to the pangs of the
Chairman of the Committee of Foreign Relations
of the Senate, who to the last persisted in be-
lieving or in stating that Great Britain had made
no absolute demand which did not admit of
either a deliciously long correspondence, or
a delicate negotiation by mediator or arbi-
trator. Some of my good friends of the sword
who have been very fierce and belligerent will, no
doubt, be difficult to appease. Men like M'Dowell,
Halleck, and General Scott, who appreciated the
gravity of the • question, have spoken of it with
moderation. Some of them, indeed, have from the
first maintained that the seizure was unjustifiable.
As to the officers of the navy, I must do them the
justice to say that those I have met were from the
first willing to surrender the Southern Commis-
sioners, and that more than one expressed the
strongest disapprobation of Captain Wilkes's act,
not withstanding that the Secretary of the Navy had
highly lauded him. Mr. Welles is of the same
opinion still, and submits to "force majeztre." Mr.
Fox, the able and experienced Assistant-Secretary
of the Navy—a naval officer who has seen the world,
and has raised his head above the clouds and mists
which dim the vision of the indigenous American
who has never stirred out of his own country—dif-
fered from his chief. There were people who went
about talking and writing in the most patriotic
manner about never surrendering till death or after-
wards, and seeing every city in a blaze before they
would surrender the prisoners. These people will
now most probably go about using the same language
in another tense, and declaring that it would have
been better to have done all sorts of things than to
have performed an act of justice, and have averted
much bloodshed and misery to two kindred nations,
while they at a blow destroyed the possibility of
success in the contest on which they had set their
hearts. The interval which has elapsed since Mon-
day, when Lord Lyons presented his note, of which
he had at several previous interviews discussed
the nature with Mr. Seward, was not unreason-
ably long, though it has given birth to a de-
spatch which might not he characterised in the
same way, and the press and the politicians were
alike in the dark as to the demands of Great Bri-
tain, and the view taken of them by the Govern-
ment. It was only the pressure of circumstances,
and the convincing arguments founded on the state
of the navy and the present position of affairs,
which prevailed over the indisposition of the
highest persons in the State to yield the prisoners.
So late as yesterday a violent speech was made in
the Senate by Mr. Hale, in introducing a resolu-
tion for the correspondence arising out of the Trent
affair.

It will be observed that the Congress did not ad-
journ over the holidays, as was proposed; to the
great disappointment of the Government they have
sat on, adjourning over a day or two and then re-
sitting wth renewed vigour. There are, indeed,
symptoms of a disposition on the part of certain
Senators and Representatives to turn the Congress
into -a permanent Committee on the state of the
nation, and they talk of sitting en permanence or
till such time as they have passed measures for the
confiscation of the South, and the emancipation of
the universal negro. The army will soon be placed
under surveillance, if " the Young Chieftain," as
the papers were wont to call him, does not effect
something. The Ides of the fatal month which
shall find Mr. Chase without a cent in his locker
are fast approaching. Whether Congress can do
anything in the premisses is hard to say, but it is
significant enough that the President did not refer
the Slidell and Mason question to the Senate, that
he abstained from speaking of it in his Message,
and that he did not even refer it to the Corm;nittee
on Foreign Relations, but that Mr. Sewar4eind, he
took on their shoulders the responsibility of the de-
cision, Here is a brief report of what took place