The Sun.
London, England, 1862-01-29 00:00:00

THE CIVIL WAR 111, AIIERICA.

(From the Special Correspondent of the Times.)
NEW YORK, JAN. 14.

It is not because New York is a good place to
learn the news or to hear the truth that I date my
letter from the commercial metropolis of the United
states. In effect Washington is for the moment the
heart of the moneyed interest, and it is there the
war is to be decided, not by the shock of armies,
but by the contests of the people who have money
with those who have it not and want to get it. I
am, may I be permitted to say, by no means a be-
liever in the omnipotence of gold or credit in war.
The sinews of war cannot be of much avail unless
there is heart, brain, and bone to give them force,
direction, and leverage. France has proved it, old
Fritz demonstrated it long ago, England in the
midst of her millionaire extravagance showed it, the
history of all nations fighting for honour, liberty,
and life has recorded it. But there is a time when
the saying is true, and a case wherein the words
are applicable, and that time may come, and that
case may arrive when the love of gain is greater
than the love of country, and when the only army
that lives and moves and has its being in the field
when the country calls for help is the noble army
of contractors. Here is the great heart, the active
brain, the strong bone of this big American people
so wearied, so feeble, so broken that the question,
in which they have only looked to one side, and on
which they have only heard one argument, seems
as though it were to be carried into regions where
neither capitalists nor statesmen, nor the Grocculi
esurientes of the political world can follow it. The
negro Victor Emmanuel has thrust his head in be-
tween the combatants at the American Solferino
and the peacemakers of Villafranca. It would ill be-
come me to say that the retirement of Mr. Cameron
from the Cabinet into the frigid seclusion of St.
Petersburg was in any way foreshadowed in the
vaticinations which have been so much resented by
the American press, but assuredly it looks as if the
dissolution of Mr. Lincoln's Government is but inau-
gurated by the deposition of the Minister of War,
and the quarrel between the Republicans and Con-
servative masses,which lie between nerolatry or rug-
ger-worship and Secession, is finding its first fruits
and its early development in the act which stops up
the bunghole of a brigadier's command with Cassius
Clay, and fills the North American Embassy at St.
Petersburg with Mr. Cameron.

It is weeks since I ventured to say what was
coming, and the
,jeers with which the prediction
was received here did not subside before it was
verified. Heaven knows it was in no spirit of
exultant prophecy that the words were written,
but, if men will set file to a magazine with a short
fuse, it requires little knowledge of gunpowder to
affirm as they light the match that some of them
will be blown up. With Mr. Cameron others must
go. The President is putting his foot down with
a vengeance, and, if it comes to a struggle between
Mr. Seward and Mr. Stanton, no one can predict
what sacrifices of men and measures may not be
made ere the factions take up the issues. It is
proved, indeed, that in international questions the
North American Demos is as mild a creature as
ever felt the dominant knee and spur of the con-
queror. There is scarce a man in broad America
who can in his heart and of his word support as an
abstract act of right the surrender of the unhappy
Southern Commissioners and their secretaries. Un-
fortunately, in the abstract public opinion has been
against it since it took place, just as it menaced
unheard of wars before it, in case Great Britain
asked for the surrender. The menaces are now in
vau/o postfuturuin. I am sure Ido no injustice to
the popular sentiment from as very high up to as
very low down as can be found in a Republic, when
I assert that the general feeling with regard to Eng-
land in the matter of Slidell and Mason is, that she
took an opportunity to make a demand which would
have been resisted had America been strong, and
that, right or wrong, the United States mean to be
avenged for the concession forced upon them, not
by a sense of justice, but by a consciousness of their
own weakness, whenever and if ever they have the
chance. If there be injustice done to them in that
expression, their own words, written and spoken,
are alone to blame. But, at least, let us admit
that Demos feels the reins and bows his neck
to the yoke. Mr. Lincoln is willing to enter for
the prize of facile submission to necessity. Bat
can Mr. Welles stay if Mr. Cameron goes on his
watery way ? Is the majority of the Congress, which
is rapidly becoming an Opposition, to gain its posi-
tion by the sacrifice of its principles ? And, in pro-
portion as the acts of Congress savour of black re-

publicanism, is the President to leaven his Cabinet
with the barm of the old democracy ? There are

100,000 men at the south side of the Potomac, but
there are also 30,000 around the capital, and if you
embarrass the Government and annoy the generals,
and insult the army, you may be made to feel that
the Frankenstein you ha're created is strong enough
to be your master, if not your destroyer. In all such
times there arises, or is developed, for the mere pur-
pose of being exterminated, as it were, a Girondin
school, who say that " black's not so black nor white
so very white." They end in feeding the hopper,
and are ground out between the upper and nether
millstones. The President, who had no particular
wish for such a fate, is evidently seeking to
strengthen himself by attempts to conciliate the
Democratic party, and they are all pleased at the
selection of Mr. Stanton as War Minister, not BO
much on account of his political views as because of
his well known integrity. lhe charges of pecula-
tion, corruption, and venality which have been made
against the heads of the army and navy administra-
tions have touched the public mind and have been
denounced in the Congress. No Government in Eu-
rope could stand against such imputations ; but here
they are made so generally against all sorts and con-
ditions of men that either the foundations of society
are rotten or the moral sense is wanting. Americans
complain loudly that they are misrepresented by fo-
reigners. They, in fact, depict themselves in blacker
colours than any stranger could venture to use; but
they lay them on thick and deep in the fulness of
their knowledge. It is only this week that a New
York alderman delared he had bought up the whole
State Legislature at Albany on a particular question
with 8,000 dols. This statement in the council was
greeted with laughter. And a paper with a large cir-
culation in the same city within a few days,observed
that such words as "liar" should be reserved for the
exclusive use of the rowdies of the back slums and
of members of Congress. As to corruption in high
places, I have heard nothing else for months back ;
not that all are venal, but that men in high office,
and with peculiar means of making fortunes for
themselves and their friends by corruption, have
done so notoriously. But it was not on account of
any such statements as these that Mr. Cameron was
nquested to resign ; it was because he took ground
in reference to the slavery question which rendered
unity of action with the President and with Gen.
M.Clelld.n impossible. His sentiments strengthened
and encouraged the Abolition Opposition in Con-
gress, and the demand made on the President by
the people of his own State—Kentucky—to remove
him, was a welcome pretext, and gave an excuse
for Mr. Cameron's dismissal.
MONDAY, Jan. 13.—The New York 7inzes this
morning suggests that the English public should be
mane acquainted with the views really entertained
by Mr. Seward in reference to Canada, and asserts
that the general belief—which your correspondent
is said to have done so much to confirm—in reference
to Mr. Seward's hostile designs on thatgreatdepen-
dency, has already very seriously impaired the
friendly relations of England and the United Stases.
There is nothing which could afford the person
appealed to greater satisfaction than the corrobora-
tion of those feelings between the two empires, and
between kindred races which are pursuing a common
object by different but not opposite paths, and he
would gladly indeed aid in dispelling any erroneous
impression at home regarding th_e_viewsofArnerican
statesmen. Mr. Seward in 180 wrote a series of
letters to the AMany Evening Journal, describing
the incidents of a tour made through Canada and
along the coast of Labrador in search of health and
fishing, and in one of these he says that, having pre-
viously entertained the idea that Canada was soon
to be taken in by the Federal Union, he had (Aug.
22, 1857) dropped the opinion as a national conceit,