The Sun.
London, England, 1861-08-27 00:00:00

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by whom, after a brief delWv
to pass on towards Fairfax-, WO!
happened, except that tlie`PrincZ
,uregard and General Johnson, and
tors of the latter ; that he examined
the battlefield as far as the horrible odour would
permit; and that he returned late on Friday even-
ing, pretty well satisfied that there was not much
to choose between the two armies, but that the
Federalists were on the whole the better of the two,
and that he would take them for choice. General
Beauregard did not make a very good impression on
the Prince, it is said, although his French is natural
to him as a New Orleans Creole. It is said by the
people who can see a long way into milestones that
the Prince will certainly propose an arbitration,
and that his visit is made with the object
of securing for France the position which
would certainly be given to the power
that might render an agreement possible. Mr.
Seward not only exhibited an inclination to
let the Prince go if he liked—he seemed to think it
would not be possible to find any sound reasons to
object to the expedition. Now, it strikes an outsider
that if the United States Government was angry
with Great Britain for placing the Confederate
States army on the footing of belligerents, and if it
has always maintained that the troops of the Con-
federate States army, so called, are rebels, the visit
of the heir to the Throne of France, minus one in
the present Imperial succession, attended by a
United States general and escort to the camp of the
rebels and to the generals in command of them,
with the sanction of the United States Government,
and the return of the party to the United States
lines, is one of the most extraordinary cases that
has ever been permitted to occur by any Govern-
ment in the world. I doubt if any neutral prince
would have been allowed to pass from the allied
lines into Sebastopol and to have returned to the
allies by either side ; but there could be no " if " in
the matter at all had the one side considered and
proclaimed the other to be rebels. It was late on
Friday when the Prince returned, and on Saturday
he left Washington for the North in company with
M. Mercier.

PRICE 4d.
STAMPED sd.

able to improve a victory as the Confederates were,
and even the possession of Richmond or of Washing-
ton would not enable the victors to dictate peace. It
is all very well to talk of an army of 500,000 men-
It is a large force ; but, if it be, America is still
larger than its action. A rapid development of the
railroad system has left parts of America in which
this war must be waged destitute of ordinary
roads, and the difficulty of moving provisions and
materiel is enormous in comparison with any part of
Europe. Nor is the country fit for such marches
as can be made across the steppes, as in India, or in
the open lands of Europe. Such roads as exist are
generally cut deep in the soil, with high banks ;
the land is covered with forest, and the cleared fields
are filled with stumps fatal to horse or waggon. Then
there are great rivers and mountain passes foodless
and desolate. An army of 500,000 men scattered
over the Southern frontier of the United States,
with its right extending down into Missouri on the
borders of Arkansas and its left resting on Fortress
Monroe represents a feeble chain, which could be
broken at any place. If it forms in strong corps,
the difficulty of transportation of food and materiel
arises. It is greater than one would imagine who
has not seen how widely scattered is the population.
The State of Georgia, for example, which is as
large as all England, has less than a million of
people. The further these corps advance the
greater must become their difficulty. They must
diverge as they advance, and the enemy will get in
between them and operate in their rear and on the
communications with their bases. The people of
the South declare they are ready for a guerilla war,
and the remarks I have made presuppose there is
no large amount of Union feeling in any of the
seceded States which would revive and become ac-
tive on the appearance of a friendly army. If we
were to judge of the States generally by what is
taking place in Missouri, however, it would seem
as if a large number of the inhabitants preferred
to let Unionist and Secessionist fight it out by
themselves. General Jackson and his friends—
General Lyon and Colonel Siegel—fight and retreat,
advance and countermarch, and engage in numerous
skirmishes, without adding one particle of force to
the cause in which they are engaged, and the mass
of the people stand neutral between them. Gover-
nor Wise flies through Western Virginia before the
Federalists, burning bridges and tearing up rail-
roads, and the inhabitants, possibly, are disgusted
equally with both sides. These desultory opera-
tions contribute little or nothing to the end of the
war. And how the poor people suffer ! We do not
know what takes place in the South, but the cries
of distress in the county exposed to the Federal
troops are loud and lamentable. Generals issue
orders, but the troops do not mind them. Houses
are entered, property is pillaged. Even in Maine
far removed from the rancour of hostilities, the mob
has recently been showing its respect for freedom of
opinion' by attacking democratic newspaper offices
and destroying and burning all they could lay their
hands on. In Maryland the voice of complaint is
loud and indignant. Respectability of station and
attachment to the Union avail but little. One officer
in command at Alexandria, within sight of the
White-house, is obliged to recommend the people
to fix the stars and stripes on all their property and
over all their houses, and then he promises, if that
does not do, to make strict inquiry into the cases of
outrage. One does not know where to look for a
solution of the difficulties which are springing up
on all sides. Not the least of them is the dangerous
socialist movement, which I foretold some time ago,
among the working classes in the northern cities,
where we may yet hear the terrible cry of the
French Revolution re-echoed by the masses whom
the war has plunged into poverty. New York. Bos-
ton, Philadelphia may well grow pale at the thought.
These mass meetings which demand bread or work
from the Government mean no good, but at present
they only indicate approaching danger rather than
its actual presence; and, meanwhile, the expendi-
ture of the Government is going on at the rate of
one million two hundred thousand (1,200,000) dol-
lars a day ! A rain of paper money is threatened.
But the capitalists see the mischief too clearly to
abandon the Government in its extremity, and it is
said here that 3NI r. Chase has succeeded in the ob-
ject of his interview with the moneyed men of New
York, and is hopeful of success in getting all the
money he wants on tolerable terms. Of all this you
will receive more accurate accounts from your re-
gular correspondent at New York. With the new
Treasury notes at 4 per cent. below par in Wall-
street the future was indeed lowering. Has it ceased
to be so ? Even Garibaldi, whom some people 133
lieve to be coming out here, can scarcely give the
Government sunshine unless he brings out with him
a loan from France and England, but if anything
could induce these countries to make an advance it
would be the pleasant tone adopted towards them
both by the American journals.
If the moneyed people hold back there can be no
doubt the churches are coming to the rescue, and as
the congregations melt away into the ranks their
pastors follow them " a-colonelling. Bishop and
Gen. Leonidas Polk, of the Southern army, has been
followed by a number of his clergy to the camp, and
one of them lately wrote a most affecting letter to
one of his rev. brethren in the North, in which he
declared with the unction of a Covenanter that he
would smite hip and thigh the aforesaid rev. brother
if he encountered him in the flesh on Southern soil.
The religion of the South is fervid. No Canaanite
was ever in worse case in Israelitish hands than
will the black Republican be who may find himself
in the grip of good, God-fearing Georgians or Caro-
linians. There has been a blessing of flags and a
cursing of enemies all over the States, the like of
which has never been seen since the time of the
Crusades—let us say in a general fashion. As one
of the coloured brethren observed of a celebrated
Baptist minister whom he followed in Savannah,
" We don't care much for him blessing ; but his
cussin' is jist bewtiful and make we feel awful
happy." But cursing is generally done, it must be
said, by implication. Notwithstanding the great
expenditure there is but little excitement visible at
Washington, unless one goes into the War and
Navy Departments, where crowds of contractors

His visit will be construed in many ways, none
of them just—the significance of the act will he
magnified and its importance exaggerated. People
here cannot understand that an illustrious person-
age travelling incognito as a neutral can visit both
camps without impropriety, and that he is animated
by no other desire than that of seeing with his own
eyes the actual condition of the contending parties.
In itself, again, the visit of the Prince will be re-
garded as nothing less than an act of preparation
for the formal recognition of the Confederacy. With
characteristic good taste, the only journal in the
world capable of such mingled folly and insolence
selects the occasion of the French Prince's visit to
accuse France of a secret hostility to the United
States and to denounce the Prince himself as a spy,
and in an excess of absurdity, which really looks
as if the paper in question were in the pay of
some bitter enemies of the United States who
are determined on its ruin, this journal, having as-
serted that France is encouraged by England, which
will soon follow her example, to break the blockade
and recognise the Southern Confederacy, demands
by way of conciliating the two great maritime
Powers of the world that a force shall be immedi-
ately prepared by the Secretary of the Navy to re-
sist the united fleets on seas where at the present
moment he has failed in establishing a blockade be-
fore his own ports. However, this is of a piece
with similar conduct, and can only be explained
on the ground already suggested.
Iu nothing is the weakness of the Federal Govern-
ment more strikingly shown than in those questions
on maritime rights on which it was wont to main-
tain such defiant language and haughty attitude.
It stigmatises 'Southern privateers as pirates, and
treats them as prisoners of war. Let us now see
what will be done in the case of those men who
were saved off the wreck of the Confederate vessel
Petrel, the stolen property of the United States
commanded by Confederate officers, which actually
engaged a United States frigate, arid was sunk by
her.

Every seagoing vessel of the United States, ex
cept five, which are now being refitted, is in active
employment, the great majority of the vessels afloat
are sailing ships, and it will be observed with sur-
prise that the new steamers ordered comprise a.
number of paddlewheel vessels. Of 1,354 commis-
sioned officers in the navy 312 were from the Con-
federate States, of whom 321 have resigned, and it
is feared that there are many officers in the service
whose hearts are not in the right place o►a this
question, or who, to use the American slang, are
" not square on the goose."