The Sun.
London, England, 1862-09-30 00:00:00

THE SUN,
LONDON, TUESDAY, SEPT. 30, 1862.

Again u.ll Bociro-pe is looleing with almost "crreetlx-
less interest to the Potomac. Even apart from the
merits of the case, it is impossible to watch the
changes in such a vast and exciting game without
unconsciously attaching ourselves, in imagination,
to one of the combatants, or at least without I
being all expectation to see which shall win.
Four days hard fighting had all gone in favour
of the Federals ; that is according to Federal
accounts. We must, however, bear in mind that
the information respecting the first of these
dhys only—Sunday the 14th--rests on the
despatches of the General in command, M.CLEL-
LAN. All the other battles up to the 17th, Wed-
nesday, we know about only from newspaper
reports, and though there seems no reason to doubt
their substantial truth, yet they may prove gravely
incorrect. Even they, however, left another battle
to be fought on the 18th to settle who should be
master. On this battle depends the expulsion of
the Confederates from Maryland or their continuance
in it. It is not to be concealed that New York has
been uneasy that three or four days should pass
without, the Government having communicated its
own information to the public. The consequence
was that the premium on gold actually advanced
again after it had fallen.

There are very different opinions as to the
strength of the Confederates. Some maintain, in
America we mean, that M'CLELLAN has encoun-
tered little more than their advance. This
we cannot believe. LEE himself has never
been with the advance before, and it seems certain
that he was present, and commanding in
person.
Both sides also were mustering their reinforce-
ments, and it is remarkable that from the day of
the first battle of Bull's Rub, to the second one, the
supports of the Confederates have always arrived
just at the right nick of time to rout the wearied
Federals. With such apparent equality of forces,
and after the Federals have in turn had their vie-
torita it is difficult, indeed, to conjecture which
aide will win the next battle north of the Potomac.
-Here in England, we might toss up or bet on the
chances, " evenly do probabilities appear to be
balanced.

Both parties have a great immediate stake to
fight for. The Federals regard Maryland as in any
ease a Union State; and the behaviour of the inha-
bitants, so far as 'At advanced, seems to show that
the Union feeling predornir
tea. The Confederates
seem to have been nepzi
Jas much mistaken in the
amount of feeling they found favourable to the
South as the Federals were in looking
for Union
feeling in Virginia. The Marylanders did not, as
expezted, rise in a mass, even when such able friends
as LEE and JACKSON were in the
midst of them.
Hence the Federals will fight to the last to drivr,
*the Confederates out of a State in which lin:ionl --
em
now predominates. Oa the other hand, the con-
They
federates want food and clothes. had
been livitN, according to accounts from all sides,g
green corn and apples"—to remain in a State
-where the war had not yet wasted the provisions
must be a great object with them, not to mention
the prestige of carrying the war into the terri-
tories of the enemy. If driven across the Potomac,
it is probable that the Southern army will find one
of its greatest difficulties to be that of procuring
food. In Northern Virginia it can find none, for it
is completely desolated and almost depopulated by
the war; and it would have to turn aside into
the famous Valley of the Shenandoah merely to
subsist itself. It would no longer threaten Wash-
ington ; and BURNSIDE is now in Harper's
Ferry, at the mouth of the Valley Both
sides have, inducement
therefore, every
to fight with unusual energy for the posse6sion
of Maryland—both were left on the 17th in a
position of seeming equality--the rival parties