The Sun.
London, England, 1866-04-30 00:00:00

ATLANTIC AND GREAT WESTERN.

The traffic return of this company for March shows a
decrease of £11,390 as compared with March of last year,
but still this is a much smaller decrease than that shown
by many important lines, and is really very satisfactory ;
compared for instance with the Michigan Southern, on
eleven miles more, the traffic only is $23,913 more ; yet
the Michigan Southern is a road so well thought of in
America that its stock commanded 80 to 81 at date of last
advices.

Again, compared with the Marietta and Cincinnati,
which line is 283 miles in length, or just about half that
of the Atlantic and Great-Western, its traffic, if doubled
to correspond with the mileage, would only amount to
$165,820, or less than one-half per mile of the receipt of
the Atlantic and Great Western.

Take again a comparison with some of our English
Railroads, the London and South-Western for example,
which is now working 5001 miles, and took for the four
weeks in March £86,037, whilst the Atlantic and Great
Western take in sterling at 4s. to the dollar (the only fair
way of reckoning as expenses are paid in the same cur-
rency as is received) is £77,696; so that here, in March,
which is one of the worst months for traffic in America,
we have a result approaching that of our London and
South-Western, than which no English Railway probably
is in a sounder condition.

The London Market for American securities has, during
the past week, been mainly influenced by the conflicting
rumours touching political affairs on the continent. The
course of business has been considerable sales on German
account, which have been met by orders for purchases for
shipment to .New York. At the close there seemed to be
a renewed demand for all descriptions, United States 5-90
Bonds closing 701 to an improvement of half per cent.
since our last. Illinois Shares have fluctuated between
80 and 82, and leave off firm at 80 to 1. Eries, on large
forced sales, were at one time sold down to 511, but from
this low quotation there has been a reaction, and they
leave off about 521, with a firmer aspect than wo have
observed for some days past,
OFFICIAL TRANSACTIONS FOR THE WEEK.—United States
5 per Cent. Bonds, 1874: Thursday, United States
6 per Cent. 5.20 Bonds, 1882: Thursday, 70;1 69* 701 69/ ;
Friday, 691 70 1 x.c. ; Saturday, 70 1 x.c. ; Monday,
701 170 e x.c. ; Tuesday, 702- 1 1 x.c. ; Wednesday,
70/ 1 x.c.. Virginian 6 per Cent. Dollar Bonds :
Thursday, 51 50; Friday, 50 ; Saturday, 511; Tuesday,
50 ; Wednesday, 50. Atlan. and Gr. Westn. (Penns.
Sect.) Ist Mrt. Bds. 1877: Friday, 72 ; Monday, 731.
Atlan. and Gt. Westn. Consolidated Bonds, 1895:
Thursday, 66 x.c. ; Friday, 65 x.c. ; Monday, 60 31 x.c. ;
Tuesday, 60 2 11 x.c. ; Wednesday, 60 x.c. Erie
Shares, $lOO, all paid : Thursday, 5411 34 ; Friday, 541 3 ;
Saturday, 521 ; Monday, 521 / ; Tuesday, 52 -1-;
Wednesday, 511 2 1. Erie Shares, 6 per Cent.
Convertible Bonds : Thursday, 734 41 ; Tuesday, 731;
Wednesday, 73. Illinois Central 6 per Cent. Bonds of
1875: Thursday, 81. Illinois Central 7 per Cent. Bonds
of 1875: Saturday, 73. Illinois Central Shares, all paid :
Thursday, 801 791 ; Friday, 791- ; Monday, 801; Tuesday,
801; Wednesday, 801 80. Panama Railroad, 2nd Mort.
7 per Cent, 1865: Friday, 102 ; Tuesday, 1011. Philadel-
phia and Erie First Mortgage, 1881: Wednesday, 74.
Pennsylvania 850 Shares : Tuesday, 401.

The Southern Press.

(From the Galveston Aews, March 23.)

We are not ashamed to confess that we expected
the doctrine of peaceable secession to be admitted
on the basis of professions which we publish else-
where in this issue ; and we believed the age of
conquest to have passed away. Mistaken as we
were, it yet remains to be determined whether the
South has not suffered for being too far ahead,
rather than from having fallen behind the time ;
and whether the parties on the other side, both
actors and interested spectators, will not finally
be compelled to reach through many throes the
political idea involved in the course of the seceding
States. Had their course been accepted according
to their own construction, free Government would
at once have attained to dignities and advantages
which are now far in the future, beyond struggles
of the most trying and dangerous character. The
time will come when political issues as fundamental
as those raised by the South must be decided with-
out war, and the worst judgment then passed
upon her will embody nothing more than the charge
of having been premature. As to principle, we have
no fear. The success involves nothing of that kind,
because the war was made for commerce and em-
pire, and not for an idea or a doctrine.

(From the Augusta Constitutionalist, March 22.)

No wonder that the saints of New England are
on their mettle and would turn the bayonets that
pinned the Union together to the utter rending in
tatters of the Federal Constitution. Cold steel has
been invoked before by legislative bodies, and the
saints are well enough read to remember how Pride's
pikemen purged the Parliament house as they would
winnow the Capital—how the Commons set up a
scaffold at Whitehall as they would erect a gibbet in
Pennsylvania avenue—how the National Assembly
worked the guillotine and robbed the rich as they,
too, would play Jack Ketch at the gallows and
Captain Macheath with each honest man's purse.
Patience has its limits, and these gentry had better
beware. Desperate measures often betray weak-
ness of cause, and if this impudent menace be but
the frothing of moribund malice, the people can and
will wait in patience the noisesome end of the radi-
cal party. But if there be so much madness, even
among these madmen, as to essay in reality the
violence threatened, it were better the men who
essay it had never been born.