The Sun.
London, England, 1862-12-30 00:00:00

the boy lived to come safely out of the terrible en-
gagement.
GENERAL " STONEWALL" JACKSON.

THE FINANCIAL STATE OF FRANCE.

At a distance of seven miles from General Lee's
head quarters, near the little village of Bunker-
hill, were the head-quarters of the hero of heroes
of this struggle, General " Stonewall" Jackson.
We had been taught to expect a morose, reserved,
distant reception; we found the most genial, cour-
teous, and forthcoming of companions. A bright,
piercing, blue eye, a slightly aquiline nose, a thin,
tall, sinewy frame, "made all over of pinwire," a
great disregard of dress and appearance—these are
the characteristics of General Jackson's exterior.
There is also about him a very direct and honest look.
The disappointing circumstance is, that his voice,
which is rapid in its utterance, is weak and unim-
pressive. Passionately attached to the Valley of Vir-
ginia, which has for so long been the principal scene
of his achievements, idolised by the inhabitants
of Winchester and of the Valley, Gen. Jackson has
acquired such a fame in that entire neighbourhood
that it is sad to think what would happen if the one
life round which such prestige clings should yield
to a stray bullet or to the chance of disease. Sinewy
and wiry as the General seems, it is impossible not
to fancy that he is wearing himself terribly by his
restless, sleepless activity, by his midnight marches,
and by the asceticism of his lire. The respect and
consciousness of his presence, and what that presence
means, exhibited by h:s staff, impressed me very
strongly, and seemed to exceed the respect exhibited
towards Gen. Lee. He spoke a few hearty words
of admiration of Gen. Lee, saying that he never
should wish to serve under an abler commander.
But his heartiest and most enthusiastic utterances
were in admiration of the Cathedral edifices of Eng-
land, and notably of York Minster. He dwelt with
great animation upon the vibration of the air pro-
duced by the deep notes of the organ in York
Minster, and which he bad never heard equalled
elsewhere. it is rare to find in a Presbyterian such
appreciation and admiration of Cathedral magnifi-
cence.

The following is a full translation of M. Fould's
Report of the financial condition of the French
Empire, the substance of which has already appeared
in our columns :
" REPORT TO THE EMPEROR.

" Sire,—The Council of State is actually termi-
nating the examination of the ordinary budget of
1864. The ' extraordinary' Estimates of the same
budget will be shortly submitted to it, so that the
Legislative Body may be enabled early in the Ses-
sion to study the financial questions. My depart-
ment completes summing up the elements of the
projects de loi (Bills) which are to furnish the sup-
plementary credits not provided for the year which
just expires. I therefore think that the moment has
arrived for completing the observations which I had
the honour to submit to the Emperor three months
ego. I will endeavour to give a brief summary of
the ensemble of our financial condition. I shall fol-
low the sime order in which the financial facts will
be brought forward, and shall examine succes-
sively :

"The probable results of the budget of 1862 ;
" The previsions for the budget of 1863 ;
" The bases of the ordinary and extraordinary
budgets for 1864.

"I.

" The report that I had the honour of submitting
to your Majesty on the 6th of last October expressed
the hope teat in the budget of 1862 the receipts
would balance the expenditure, in spite of the heavy
charges which resulted from the credits opened be-
fore the adoption of the Senatus-Consultum of the
21st of December, 1861, and in spite of the expenses
of the Mexican expedition. I t was not possible at
that time to estimate with sufficient precision the
total to which those expenses for the entire year
1862 would amount. lam now able to give a state-
ment of that total.

"The credit carried to the amended budget of
1862 for the Mexican expedition and the supple-
mentary credits accorded by a special law, passed
before the separation of the Corps Legisli tit', amount
together to 59,000,000 f. The Minister of War
thinks that he will have to ask the Legislative Bedy
for a fresh sum of 6,000,000 f. for his department.
The Minister of Marine estimates at 16,000,000 f.
tee supplement he requires. This increase i❑ the
expo lases of 24,000,000 f. will raise to 83,000,000 f.
the total expenses of the Mexican expedition dur-
ing the year 1862 ; to this will be added a credit
of 11,000,000 f. that my department will have to
ask for to provide for the premiums paid upon the
exportation of sugar; these two sums (together
35,000,0001.) appear to represent the total defi-
ciency of the receipts for the budget of 1862. The
previsional statement that I shall have the honour
of submitting to your Majesty as soon as the final
results of the year are known will justify this cal-
culation.

There are such endless stories about Gen. Jack-
son that to repeat them would fill a volume. Stories
of his being wrapt in prayer in the midst of a fierce
engagement—stories of the unaffected earnestness
and piety of his life in tent, and of his black ser-
vant saying that when his master, who invariably
prays morning and evening, rises also in the middle
of the night to pray, he knows that peat and criti-
cal events are imminent. A most undemonstrative,
reticent man, doubtless, in all that regards his voca-
tion of a soldier. There is every reason to think
that, when the war is over, Gen. Jackson will be
the very first man to bury himself in the deepest
obscurity of private life. Throughout this war it
has been the practice of Gen. Jackson to throw him-
self, disregarding his own inferiority of numbers,
upon large bodies of his enemy, and the day is ordi-
narily half-won by the suddenness and desperation
of the attack. His usual policy then is to retire,
upon which the correspondents of the Northern
journals, who upon the day of Gen. Jackson's on-
slaught, have been half-frightened out of their
lives, announce with their usual fanfares a great
Federal victory, and joy and exultation are uni-
versal. In a few days, however, when the Federals
have reached some spot where it suits General
Jackson to attack them, he pounces upon theca
again, and frequently the very fame of his second
approach drives his opponents to a precipitate re-
treat without fighting, if the ground admits of such
a possibility. The upshot of nearly a year and a
half of General Jackson's conduct of the war, fre-
quently at the head of no more than a handful of
men, is that no permanent foothold has been gained
by the Federals in the Valley, and that, at will,
General Jackson has run his opponents, sometimes
including at once two or three Federal Generals of
rank, out of the Valley. As there are many
conflicting reports about the origin of the name
" Stonewall," it may be interesting to repeat the
true circumstances under which it was given. In
the first battle of Manassas, on July 21, 1861,
General Bee, of South Carolina (himself subse-
quently killed in the same action), observing his
men flinching and wavering, called out to them to
stand firm, exclaiming, "Look at Jackson's men ;
they stand like a stone wall!" In his official report of
the battle, Gen. Beauregard employed the same ea-
r. ession in connection with General Jackson's com-
mand, and the name has clung to General Jackson
ever since.

" The Minister of War has been able to provide
by temporary arrangements for the most urgent un-
foreseen expenses which fall upon his department.
As regards the Naval Department, the extraordi-
nary expenses of which, incurred at 2,000 leagues
from France, are paid by draughts on the Treasury,
the vote of the Legislative Body will be given at
the proper moment to grant the supplementary
credit asked from it. This measure will be sub-
mitted to the Legislative Body early in the session,
conformably to the rules and spirit of the Senatus
Consultum of Dec. 21.

" In fact if the expenses in Mexico have exceeded
by nearly 24,000,u00f. the special resources which
have been granted, it is scarcely necessary to ob-
serve, on the other hand, that your government
found itself in presence of one of those eventuali-
ties foreseen by the legislator. The reporter of the
Council of State, in his exposition of the motives of
the Senatus Consultum, and the President of the
Senate, in his report, both agreed in placing in the
number of such eventualities circumstances impos-
sible to be foreseen, such as a sudden scourge, or
events abroad, which would exact the immediate
development of our naval and military forces.' As
regards these unforeseen circumstances which do
not correspond with any previsions of the budget,'
the President of the Senate declared, without hesi-
tation, Under such circumstances government is
only possible on the condition of providing for
such wants by exceptional measures.'
" The reporter of the Council of State even anti-
cipated the case where various circumstances,
among which distance is reckoned, would not allow
the exact amount of outlay incurred to be ascer-
tained except after a long interval. This is what
has happened as regards the outlays which fall
upon the navy with regard to Mexico. 'lt must
not be overlooked,' said the reporter of the Council
of State, that there are certain expenses the
amount of which cannot be ascertained till they
have to be settled, and the payment of which is
made, not in the last months of the year in which
they are incurred, but in the last months of the
budget to which they belong. In this case and in
this species of outlays the Legislative Body will
take them into consideration as soon as it meets.'

" The Session of the Legislative Body will open
in a few days, and it will not refuse its sanction to
the estimates that will be at once brought before it.
An assembly animated by such patriotic sentiments
will not challenge the right of the Government to
have acted, under circumstances which no one could
have foreseen, and which admitted of no delay.
The honour of our flag, engaged in a distant land,
the safety of the brave soldiers who, at 2,000 leagues
from France, uphold the glory of our arms, made it
the duty of the Government to act without one
moment's delay. The resources at hand and the
proximate opening of the Session rendered needless
an extraordinary convocation of. the Legislative
Body.

"The present year will thus have to put to the
most rigorous and most decisive proof the new finan-
cial regulations established by the Senatus Consul-
tum of the 21st of December, 1861. It is now de-
monstrated that the abandonment of the preroga-
tive of opening credits by decree has not deprived
the Government of independent means of action,
and that those stronger guarantees with which
your AL,jesty has thought fit to surround the pub-
lic finances, even at the cost of one of your Majesty's
prerogatives, has not in any way prejudiced the
progress of public affairs. Everything combined to
render the experience as complete as possible. This
first year that might have been regarded as a period
of transition, had to support, as I have above said,
heavy charges created before the opening of the
Senates Consult um. To this burden has been added
a distant expedition, undertaken with the co opera-
tion of two powerful allies, and which we have been
obliged to pursue alone.

" While this expedition was suddenly assuming
proportions which could not have been foreseen a
few months before, the civil war which distracts
America continued to a deplorable rebound in the
suffering of several branches of our industry, which
it was necessary to assist. In spite of this combi-
nation of unfavourable circumstances the transfers
which have become necessary amount, for all the
Ministerial departments, to only 14,000,000 f.
Nearly all of these transfers have been effected
by means of the savings realised, so that there
will be no necessity to appeal to the Legislative
Body.
" Doubtless your Majesty will not deem these de-
tails and these figures unnecessary, showing, as
they do, that the generous sacrifice your Majesty
has made of a prerogative exercised by preceding
Governments has in no way compromised the pro-
gress of affairs. It is equally necessary to point
out the difference between the present position of
things and that of last year at the same period. The
supplementary and extraordinary credits which
were added to the budget of 1861 amounted to
345,000,000 f., of which 261,000,000 f. had been
opened by decrees. During the year 1862, on the
Contrary, with the exception of the fonds de con-
cours,
and the reports in respect of which the option
given by the Senatus-Consultum has been made
use of, no credit has been opened by decree ; the
credits added by Legislative sanction to tho budget
have been 196,000,0001., and a supplimentary
credit of 3&,000,000L, which will be applied for
in the Legislative Body, will be sufficient to sette
the unexpected expenses of 1862, Mto the trans-

THE SUN, `LONDON, TUESDAY EVENENG, DECEII3ER 30, 1862.

fers necessitating an application for credits, they do
no exceed 1,200,000 f.

" I will now briefly ex :mine the budget of 1863. I
That budget was voted with an excess of receipts
of 8,300,000 f. It we assume that the product of
the taxes and of the revenues will reach in 1863
the same total as in 1862, the estimated excess of
the receipts will be exceeded by, at least,
60,000,000 f. It will be increased also by 5,000,000 f.,
which figured in the budget for the reimburse-
ment of the Bank, and which, by the term of
the convention of the 21st June, 1857, cannot be
demanded before the expiration of the privile..,e
of that establishment—viz., in 50 years. Reckon-
ing, in addition, some other savings that may be
effected in the interest on the floating debt, I have
estimated an excess of receipts of 80,000,000 f.
There is no presumption in supposing that the con-
stant progress of the public revenue, which for the
last ten years has been about 38,000,000 f, a year,
will not stop in 1863. Even though it should be
only 30,000,000 f. for that year, the excess of re-
ceipts would not reach to much less thanllo,ooo,ooof,
and would allow us to meet the expenses of the
Mexican expediti;n in 1863, as well as the unfore-
seen expenses that might be required at home.
Without wishing to anticipate the future, it may
be conjectured that the Mexican expedition will
not occasion in 1863 the grave expenses of trans•
port and victualling which have weighed so heavily
upon the budget of 1862. In fact, the expeditionary
corps is now upon Mexican soil ; it is furnished
with all requirements for a forward march ; and
from the commencement it will find itself in a re-
gion where the provisioning will be easier and less
onerous. Whatever the issue of this hope, the ex•
eess of receipts, the source of which has just been
indicated, justifies us, under any circumstances, in
expecting that theequilibrium of the budget of 1863
will not be disturbed.