The Sun.
London, England, 1861-01-26 00:00:00

AMERICA.

The following is an extract from a letter dated
Boston, January 7 :
" I send by this mail a copy of the message of our new
Governor Andrew. He is the man who at a public meet-
ing for the relief of John Brown's family, dared to say that,
whatever might be said about the rightfulness of what he
did, John Brown himself was right.' This speech has
been construed into an approval of what Mr. Brown did,
and Mr. Andrew's election to our chief magistracy is the
one thing that gives a slight colour to the pretence that
the South are now acting in self-defence in anticipation of
Northern aggression. It is, of course, a mere pretext, and
the message, without alluding to it, is the best ar swer to
it. The great slave case of Canada, it is said, will be referred
to your side before giiing the man up. I hope the report
about the slave is true, for if there is the slightest equit-
able or technical mode of avoiding it his surrender would
be an eternal blot upon your escocheon. lam no lawyer,
but it seems to me by the report that the two judges who
condemn him are wrong, and the ono who acquits him
weak and narrow, or else your treaty of extradition ought
to be annulled at the earliest possible moment. You surely
do not mean to give up men guilty only of political offences I
If John Brown inaugurated treason and invasion with 20
men, I cannot see how you can put the crime of the slave
when enforcing his freedom, whether singly or in large
numbers, into any other category than that of political
offences.

" Give up this poor wretch as a murderer, and you mus
call the next slave who escapes a thief, because he carried
with him his shirt, belonging, by the Missouri laws, to his
master ; and next the white fugitive from some border
State who carries with him his own property which may
have been adjudged forfeited to the State (with his life) for
having spoken ill of the ' institution.' In short, you, like
our own North, must make a stand, or you will be required
to eat dirt until you rebel I
" What a commentary Douglas is now giving upon the
blindness of those Northern men who at one time would
have pressed him upon us as a champion of Northern rights!
During the election hemp and gunpowder were too slow for
those who would resist the inauguration of the candidate
elected by the people. Now our lion roars you
as gently as -.any sucking dove, will eat without salt
any words he ever said, if he can thus help to save
our glorious Union, and, forsooth, does not approve
of coercion towards a State I He proves conclu-
sively tho truth of our anticipations that, if chosen,
he would have been the most supple tool of the planters,
and would have vented his chivalry upon the small nations
south of us whose territory his Southern masters want for
the extension of the ' atea of freedom.' I will try to send
you an illustrated paper (if not already sent) containing a
map of Charleston harbour, with its forts—the scene of a
little incident which may prove as famous in our history as
Captain Clive's movement upon Arcot. Major Anderson's
simple, but effective checkmate now looks like the very
turning-point of our present struggle, and it has already
made him the favourite of the betting-men for our great
race of 1864. It has turned the traitor Floyd out of our
Cabinet, braced up our old public functionaries' weak nerves,
kindled the enthusiasm of the country north and south,
brought General Scott and other kindred spirits into rap-
port with the Administration, and given us hope the
other strong forts along our Southern coast may be gar-
risoned, and the madmen of the South held thus in checof
until the 4th of March ; after which we will take
them dreia.
t?;:enee can manage it
them until they find the sweets of taxation .and otherwill cause a
culties intrinsic to their situation,
which
hniwoilv a voice.
reaction, and give the moderate party once
checked, and
Let the momentum of the revolutioan
it will be seen to be so utterly modehat 7 . .
will bring
rnm ent the stronger
and we shall see our Government
all right,
Then a little proper force and prG conciliation will bring
foro thein edea tremendouskue s
(or test it will have been put to by the
mb
treason) of our rulers and mad
combined
energy of our 'governing. class, the '
planters.' A friend
just from, Washington tells me that the horses have run
-away with the drivers—the leaders are now pushed on
by the mob of poor whites, and especially of small
slavebolders, who want the African slave trade re-opened,
and that the property holders are in a state of terror, with
their slaves on one side threatening, and their Democracy
already rising up on the other. The element of safety is
the awakened spirit of the North, which will now, I hope,
prevent any disgraceful patching up, übder the specious
guise of compromise ; and the danger, on the other hand, is
from our weak President, and from a possible slave insur-
rection, which would call to its aid a hundred men of the
John Brown stamp, and might settle the question either
St. Domingo fashion, or by calling in the North to repress
it and the mob at the same time. I wish you had happened
to be here now to see the working of this great strain upon
our machine. Among the details of the crisis are a short,
grain crop at the South and a commercial panic there,
against an abundant harvest North and West, It is an
exciting time."