The Sun.
London, England, 1861-02-23 00:00:00

AMERICA.

LONDONDERRY, FRIDAY NIGHT.

The Montreal Ocean Company's steamer Bohe-
mian, from Portland (Maine) on the 12th inst., has
arrived, and landed all mails except those for
Liverpool.
The Anglo-Saxon and the Canada had arrived
out. The Bohemian passed the North American
on the 14th inst.

Five vessels belonging to New York shipowners
had been seized at Savannah in retaliation for the
seizure of muskets at the former city. The vessels
were, however, subsequently released on the muskets
being given up.

The Southern Congress had constituted a pro-
visional government, which would immediately
enter upon its duties. No plan of compromise or
reconstruction had been entertained. Mr. Jeffer-
son Davis had been chosen President, and Mr.
Alex. H. Stevens, Vice-President. These actions
had been endorsed by the Louisiana Convention.
Tennessee had voted against the bolding of a
convention.

It was expected that Fort Sumter would be
attacked on the 12th inst. Government intended
to send reinforcements immediately.

Mr. Lincoln had started for Washington.

It was thought propable that the Peace Confe-
rence at Washington would make its report on
the 12th inst.

It was reported that the British consul at Ha-
vannah had been tarred and feathered, but the
report was believed to be false.

COMMERCIAL INTELLIGENCE.
NEW YORK, FEB. 9.

Exchange depressed. Bankers' bills, 1051.
Cotton sales, 1,100 bales middling upland, 111.
Breadstuffs drooping. Provisions quiet. Stocks
dull ; New York Central, 76 ; Illinois, 742 ; Erie,

NEW ORLEANS, FEB. 9.
Cotton has a declining tendency. Sales to-day,
4,500 bales mid4ling, 101.

LATEST BY TFLEGRAPH.

NEW YORK, FEB. 11.

Stocks buoyant ; New York Central, 761; Erie,
31i. Cotton dull and irregular. Breadstuffs
slightly lower. Provisions dull.

(From the New York Herald, Feb. 9 )

NEGOTIATIONS RESPECTING FORT SUMTER.
WASHINGTON, FEB. 8.

The President of the United States, in a message trans-
mitted to both Houses of Congress to-day, says that all the
correspondence which occurred in December last between
the Commissioner from South Carolina and himself was
sent in with his message of January 8. On the 14th of that
month Colonel Hayne called and informed him that he was
the bearer of a letter from Governor Pickens, which he
would deliver next day. He (Hayne), however, was induced
by the interposition of Hon. Jefferson Davis and nine other
Senators from the seceded and seceding States, not to de-
liver the letter on the day appointed, nor was it communi-
cated to the President until the 31st of January, when
Col. Hayne' s letter of that date was also communicated.

The letter of Hon. Jefferson Davis and the nine Southern
Senators urging this delay bears the date of January 15,
and was the commencement of a correspondence the whole
of which, in the President's possession, he now submits to
Congress. Most of these letters have recently been pub
lished.

The following is the concluding part of Colonel Hayne's
letter :

COLONEL RAYNE TO THE PRESIDENT.

--s- Washington, Jan. 31, 1861.
I advert to this point fdr the purpose of saying that to
send reinforcements to Fort Sumter coull not serve as a
means of protecting and preserving the property, for it
must be known to your Government that it would inevi-
tably lead to immediate hostilities, in which property on
all sides would necessarily suffer. South Carolinahas every
disposition to preserve the public peace, and feels, I am
sure, in full force those high Christian and moral duties
referred to by your Secretary, and it is submitted that on
her part there is scarcely any consideration of mere pro-
perty, apart from honour and safety, which could induce
her to do aught to the prejudice of that peace, still less to
inaugurate a protracted and bloody civil war. She holds
her position on something higher than mere property. It is
in consideration of her own dignity as a sovereign and the
safety of her people which prompt her to demand that the
property should not longer be used as a military post by a
Government she no longer acknowledges. She feels this to
be her Imperative duty—it has, in fact, become an absolute
necessity of her condition.
Repudiating as you do: the idea of coercion, avowing '
peaceful intentions, and expressing a patriot's horror of
civil war and bloody strife among those who were once '
brethren, it is hoped that, on further consideration, you wil
not, on a mere question of property, refuse the reasonable
demand of South Carolina, which honour and necessity
alike compel her to indicate. Should you disappoint this
hope, the responsibility for the result surely does not rest
with her. If the evils of war are to be encountered, espe-
cially the calamities of civil war, elevated statesmanship
would seem to require that it should be accepted as the
unavoidable alternative of something still more disastrous
—such a national dishonour or measures materially affecting
the safety or permanent interests of a people, that it
should be a choice deliberately made and entered upon—
war and its set purpose. But that war should be the inci-
dent or accident attendant on a policy professedly peaceful
and not required to effect the object which is avowed as the
only end intended, can only be excused where there has
been no warning given as to the consequence.
lam instructed to further say that South Carolina can-
not by her silence appear to acquiesce in the imputation
that the was guilty of an act of unprovoked aggression on
firing on the Star of the West. Though an unarmed vessel,
she was filled with armed men, entering her territories
against her will, with the purpose of reinforcing a garrison
held within her limits, and against her protest. She for-
bears to recriminate by discussing the question of the pro-
priety of attempting such reinforcement at all, as well as of
the disguised and secret manner in which it was intended
to be effected ; and on this occasion she will say nothing as
to the manner in which Fort Sumter was taken, into the
possession of its present occupant.
The interposition of the Senators who have addressed
you was a :circumstance unexpected by my Government,
and unsolicited certainly by me. Tha Governor of South
Carolina, while he appreciates the high and generous mo-
tives by which they were prompted, and while he fully
approves the delay, which, in deference to them, has taken
place in the presentation of this demand, feels that it can-
not longer be withheld.
I conclude with an abstract from instructions just re-
ceived by me from the government of South Carolina :
The letter of the President, through Mr. Holt, may be
received as the reply to the question you were instructed
to ask. As to his assertion of his right to send reinforce-
ments to Fort Sumter, you were instructed to say to
him, if he asserted that right, that the State of South
Carolina regarded such a right, when asserted or with an
attempt at its exercise, as a declaration of war. If the
President intends it shall not be so understood, it is pro-
per, to avoid any misconception hereafter, that he should
be informed of the manner in which the Governor will
i feel bound to regard it. If the President, when you have
stated the reasons which prompt the Governor in making
the demand for the delivery of Fort Sumter upon the
pledge you have been :authorised to make, should re-
fuse, you will communicate that refusal without delay to
the Governor. If the President shall not be prepared to
give you an immediate answer, you will communicate to
him that his answer may be transmitted within a reason-
able time to the government at this place (Charleston).
The Governor does not consider it necessary that you (I)
should remain longer in Washington than is necessary to
execute this the closing duty of your (my) mission in the
measures now indicated to you (me). As soon as tke Gov-
ernor shall receive from you information that you have
closed your mission, and the reply, whatever it may be, of
the President, he will consider the conduct which may be
necessary on his part.
Allow me to request that you will, as soon as possible,
inform me whether, under these instructions, I need
await your answer in Washington, and if not, I would be
pleased to convey from you to my Government informa-
tion as to the time when an answer may be expected in
Charleston.
The following is Mr. llolt's reply :
War Department, Feb. 6, 1861.
Sir,—The President has received your letter of the 31st
ult., and has charged me with the duty of replying
thereto. In the communication addressed to the Presi-
dent by Governor Pickens under date of 12th of January,
and which accompanied yours, now before me, his Ex-
cellency says :—" I have determined to send to you ills
Hon. J. W. Hayne, tho Attorney-General of the State of
South Carolina, andi have instructed him to demand the
surrender of Fort Sumter, in the harbour of Charleston, to
the constituted authorities of South Carolina. This des
mend I have made of Major Anderson, and which I now
make of you, is suggested because of my earnest desire to
avoid the bloodshed, which a persistence in your attempt to
retain the possession of that fort will cause, and which will
be unavailing to secure to you that possession, but induce a
calamity most deeply to be deplored." The character of
datedjan ,i a trhy,
the demand which was authorised to be made appears,
under the influence, I presume, of the correspondence with
Excellency,
o
the Senators to which you refer, to have been modified by
e
t2h6eths,ubasnedqureencteiivnesdtrbuyctiyonous
yourself
on
the 3
in which he says, "If it be so, that Fort Sumter '
as property, the rights whatever they may is held
United States can be ascertained, and for the satisfactionof the
of these rights, on the pledge of the State of
South, Ca-
rolina, you are authorised to give the full The
precise purport of your instructions, as thusseope:
you have expressed iu the following" words
4modified,
: ' I do not
come as a military man to demand the surrender of a for-
tress, but as the legal officer of the State,
General, to claim for the State the its Attorney •
x se of its undoubted
right of eminent domain, and toexercise
good all injury to the rights
the exercise of the claim
should not sufficiently of properly which arise from
define pledge the State to make
" and lest this explicit language your position you add, `'The .
proposition now is that her (South (S Carolina's) law
°facer
,