Daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, Va. [W. Va.]) 1859-1865, 1861-09-23
gaiIggmtelligemfer
PRINCE NAPOLEON oN.THE WAR.

PRINCE NAPOLEON ON. THE WAR,
Opinions on Political Parties, Con-
gress, Lending Men, Social Manners.
and the Future Destiny OF America.
Translated for the New York Herald from the
opinione Rationale of Paris Sept 8.
WASHINGTON, August u, 1861.
In the letter which l wrote you from
New York on the 3lst JuIy, informed you
of my intention to see more closely the
political men in whose hands are placed
tie deStines of the United States, and to
examine, if possible, the positions of the
belligercnt armies. | avail myself of the
sailing of the steamer to convey to you my
impressions, aud 1 shall do so ,cdM all Tie
the sincerity imposed upon me by the most
iireiy faith in tie future Of the american na-
ton, aud by the desire of seeing it emerge
quickly from the crisis in which it is
plunged. 1t was on the 4th of August
that came here, and halted, not ut Wash
ington itself, but at Georgetown, small
city which is Il suburb of the federal cap
ital. Georgetown has most delightful
situation. Tie house which occupy is
removed from the noise of the city, and
may pass for villa. 1t is well shaded
and quite. The surrounding scenery is
rural and peaceful. Magnificent trees
| of the New World, remnants of tie old
forest-project their gigantic shadows,
over meadow OF lively clear green.
which falls in gentle slope. At about u
mile distance ribbon of silver appears to
! flow through the foliage; it is the Potomac,
an arm of the sea, four times as wide as
! the Rhine. On the opposite shore extend
beautifully wooden hills, which, inclining
1 towards the left, allow the spires and roofs
. -. L.
in IL distant horizon.
! On the plains and slopes beyond the Po-
tomnc are scattered numberless small white
spots, and the tops of the great trees are
bathed in whitish smoke which relieves
admirably the rawish tones OF the land
scupe. The spots are the tents of the
Northern army, OF the army of the Union,
which protects Washington on the right
shore of the Potomac. The white smoke
is that OF the bivouacs of camp of 20,-
600 men. ] have crossed. at the rate of
thirty-six miles the hour, the distance
which separates New York from Washing
ton. | have had the spectacle of those
great works of American industry which
are to ours what the great cities OF Baby
| lon and NueveiI were 10 our towns. |
have crossed arms of the sea with II fright
( full rnpidity on two iron rails suspended
over the abyss. l have arrived. ut full
/ steam, on the top Of immense edifces, the
lower stories Ut which were occupied by
/ people or applied to uses unknown to me /;
! then have felt the cdiiicc move, and haze
I perceived that WAS oil II steamboat and
that they had run on it the train of cars
Just us IL bale O cotton would be placed on
Nn ordinary vessel. To vary thcSc SPLEEN
did but somewhat irightful spcctacirS, |
h,tN.E hon al ltA
army in the iicld-cvcrywhcre tents, wag-
ons, conveys of sick or wounded, dark and
soiled uniforms, gloomy aud grave faces of
soldiers, who, with their guns between
their legs and with Indifferent and sad eX-
preston, watch you as you pass. Balti-
more gave ME somewhat the idea of be-
sieged city; as to Washington, imagined
myself while traversing it, in town in
vnded, Overruu, stained by war at the mo-
ment of the passage and s0journ OF great
armies, or Just AS, two years ago, III Italy,
( ! have seen Alexandria, Brescia and Milan.
The peaceful federal city has appeared to
me almost under the aspect of Il camp,
with streets encumbered with horses, wag-
Ons, guns, and resOuuding with the rattle
/ of drums, with the houses transformed luto
hospitals and barracks, their open windows
exposing scenes of suffering, uncleanlincss
and disorder. Well, as AZ resting place
from all these things, grand or terrible or
painful, not TO speak of Il dog day heat
and Of n Saharian dust, find myself sud
denly at Georgetown in the midst of YER
dure. i'll the bosom of quiet, tranquil ma
turc, taking from its contact with the most
prosaic works of men only some features
calculated to set off its poetic beauty.
We will speak some other time of pic
turcsque America. At this moment our
concern is with America, political, war
Like prey to civil war and TO most ter
riblc revolutions, neither more nor less
than are tue old nations of the Old World.
! will speak 10 you to-day of the men OF
the government but first, it will be well
to recall, in IL few words, some facts of CO.
tcmporaneous history. You know that
the old American parties, Loyalists, Fed
eralists, Wings, Democrats, Know Moth
ings, after successive dislocatious, fusions
and transformations, ended by being mass
cd into two great divisions, Democrats and
Republicans. 1t is useless to state that
these names, almost arbitrary, do not ;tt all
correspond in America to the ideas which
they would represent in France.
Here the Republicans are completely
Democrats, and the Democrats entirely re.
publican, in the sense which we generally
attach to those words. Really, the distnc-
ton between the two parties rests almost
exclusively on the manner of regarding
the slavery question. The Democrats
speak of Northern Democrats, for in the
South the slavery interest dominates and
controls all politics-exccpt slavery, and
seek, at most, to confne it to the States
where it exists Buchanan aud Douglas
have been the last heads of that party to
which the interested adhesion of the South
has given, in these latter times, constant
and marked preponderance in the direction
of affairs. The Republican party, of later
date, without exactly inscribing on its
banner the principle of the abolition OF
slavery, has a manifest tendency to seek
that result. The skilful men of the party
,r. fo from ocknow ledpinp that pretenSiOn,