The Sun.
London, England, 1862-06-23 00:00:00

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11
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the North are, they seem to think royalty and

prowess go together, for one of these steam rams
is named the Queen, another- the Monarch. The
Queen struck a Confederate boat, and stuck to
it some little time, but on drawing out its iron
beak the Confederate began to sink. But the
Confederates played the same game, and the Queen
herself Was struck and disabled, though not fatally.
The Monarch then went to work, and sunk the
boat that struck the Queen. Another boat strikes
the Monarch, but the Monarch heeds it not ; on
the contrary, her Majesty dashes into and
beats in the sides of the Beauregard, who
also gets a shot into her boiler from
another gunboat. Meantime the Monarch dashes
at the Little Rebel, but not having enough head-
way, pushed the smaller ship before her, the com-
modore and crew escaping—how is not said—in
boats, probably. Then the Monarch seeing the
Beauregard sinking, and desirous to save a trophy,
turns round and tows her into shoal water to cradle
herself there. Our Admiralty will surely endea-
vour to get full particulars of this rEnovation of the
battles of antiquity—battles fought with brazen
beaks and banks of oars—and now on the Missis-
sippi with beaks of iron and steam for the motive
power. Assuredly, it will not do to build our gun-
boats and larger ships too fast.

Memphis surrendered in better style than New
Orleans. There does not seem to tave been much
cotton burnt, or much if any waste of property ;
and with a little mob resistance, the Federal flag
was hoisted on the public buildings. The Union-
ist sentiment was, however, not to be
found. The Mississippi may be said to be quite
open, for Vicksburg can oppose no resistance to
the combined fleets. But the North has
still three important seaports to take,
Mobile, on the Gulf of Mexico, has had a squadron
beleaguering it some time, but is not yet captured
nor do we hear that Fort Morgan, which guards
the channel has been taken. Savannah, in Georgia,
has been left unmolested, even since the fall of Fort
Pulaski, its only important defence, but against
Charleston a serious move has been made. The
Federals have taken possession of islands which
command the place, and they will be sure to make
an example of the Traitor City, the prime mover in
the Rebellion, and the first to fire on the Federal
flag and trail it in the dust. The cry in the North
is that Charleston must be made like Sodom and
Gomorrah !

On the whole, the Federal arms seem to be again
everywhere triumphant• BEAITREGARD'S army is
dispersing; FREMONT is in hot—too hot—pursuit
of JACKSON; M'CLELLAN is in his position before
Richmond, largely reinforced, and waiting only the
falling of the waters ; and it hardly seems probable
that the Confederates, who failed to crush a part of
his army first, can now crush or resist the
whole. To all appearance a battle substantially
decisive of the great military campaign must be
heard of in a few days. The only alternative sug-
gested is, that the remains of all the Southern
armies should make their way to Texas. This,
however, would be useless. The North would
never let them rest there ; and woe to the French
EMPEROR if he should venture to acknowledge the
South, receiving in return its acquiescence in a
French protectorate of Mexico.

The Cotton Famine increases. In Blackburn
alone the number of unemployed now exceeds ten
thousand. Of these 1,00 are receiving, certainly,
irregular employment just for the time being, at
the rate of a shilling a-day from the local board of
guardians. Enough, and probably (in:remembrance
of their families) but little more than enough, to
keep body and soul together. While a solitary
thousand out of the ten thousand and upwards
thrown out of regular employment by the compul-
sory closing of We factories in Blackburn and its
immediate neighbourhood, are thus humanely kept
alive by the care of the guardians of the parish—
not less than 9,500, it is calculated, are there abso-
lutely without any occupation whatever. It will be
uuderstood,then, through this single instance of the
town of Blackburn, bow lamentably true was that
remark made the other evening in the House of
Commons by the hon. member for Stockport, to the
effect that the cotton famine meant in realty a
dearth of food—destitution—starvation. And the
deplorable results of this lack of the raw material
of cotton go on increasing and multiplying. As
the summer advances, and the terrible winter sea-
son comes more distinctly within our ken, at but a
very little distance from us, there in perspective—
the miserable plight of the poor factory operatives
at Blackburn—(fixing our regard for awhile upon
the state of things just now visible at Blackburn
simply as a case in poin')—the utterly forlorn con-
dition of those poor factory operatives at Blackburn
appears every day to become more and more
piteous, and more and more threatening.

To show how seriously beyond the average is
the general amount of destitution now afflict-
ing that particular locality, it will be enough to
bear in mind for a moment the afflicting contrast
brought to view, upon a comparison of the returns
laid before the guardians by the relieving officers
of the parish, in the single week but just past, and
those which were in the same way presented to the
guardians for the corresponding week in the last
twelvemonth. The week particularized was no
other in point of fact than the one ending on last
Saturday. During that week more than eleven
thousand (11,193) persons had been relieved. A
cost being thereby imposed upon the parish of
£660 2s. 4d. Whereas in the corresponding week
last year the exact number relieved was set down
at 2,432 persons—this comparatively moderate ex-
tent of parochial relief necessitating an outlay of
of £132 98. 4d. It is particularly lamentable to
learn, as we do, that out of the eleven thousand
and odd who a week ago received aid in kind
from the parish authorities at Blackburn, over
four thousand of these (4,064) are described
in the returns as "ablebodied." Altogether the re-
cipients of parochial relief down at Blackburn are
known to have already increased since last year at
the rate
of more than 6.0 per cent.—the advance I
in the same wirs.
in the number of those seeking and
obtaining relief this
year and last year in the con-
tiguous districts of Darwin and Oswaldtwistle,
at a rate of little more than
100 par cent. Within
a single year, remember !
at thatamount
o uonnte
fd itshtrei cltocoal destitution of considerablyf Blackburn an increase in
the
over 600 per cent. ! Prom that
one particular,
from that one isolated illustration of
the state of
things now being witnessed down in the manufac•
be readily
how
turing districts, it may imagined
very serious, how very alarming the consequences
of the cotton famine have become. Besides all that
has been here mentioned in regard to the actual
state of things at this moment down at Blackburn,
there is a supplementary intimation yet to be made
to the effect that nearly two hundred (190) more
inmates than there were last year are now
housed in the Blackburn Workhouse. All this
while, apart from the energetic efforts made to re-
lieve the prevailing distress in that locality by the
parish guardians, the Relief Committee is hard at
work, and that unceasingly, in the same generous
endeavour. The members of that benevolent Re-
lief Committee having within the self-same week,