The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1861-04-07


hhds n 4xc. 6xc. for Cuba, and 5xc. elc for
Porto Rico, aAd LOO boxes At 6c and $50 hhds melado
on private terms Coffee was dull with small sales a
stesdy prices Freghts steady, with fair amount
OF engagements.
The War Question-Fort Pickens the
Game OF the Administrators.
The recent "masterly inactivity" of our new
administration has ceased to be mystery. tits
at length understood. Professions and appear
snces of peace, Cancellation and forbearance In
regard to the seeded States were all well
upon Wall street for eight millions in the
way OF loan, and in view of certain elections
in Connecticut and Rhode Island. But those
elections being over, and Mr.. Chase's loan hay
ing been sufficiently successful to delude him
with the idea that, come what may, he has only
to ask in order to receive any amount Of money
from our Wall street financiers, we find that all
the e late professions and pretences of peace
AID Cancellation were only DISCUSSES, which,
having served their objects, are now thrown
aside. The people of Connecticut and Rhode
IslaLd have been deceived, and the sharp and
knowing money changers of Wall street have
been cgregiously humbugged. War, and not
peace, it is now manifest, has been all along
the fixed policy aud purpose of Mr.. Lincoln's
administration.
Our new President has some reputation as a
joker, and the practical jokes, in the game Of
hide and seek, which he has been playing
with Fort Sumter for several weeks, have GER
tainly been very amusing. Astonished one day
by authentic advices from Washington of a
Cabinet decision for the immediate evacuation
of said fort, and taken somewhat aback the
next day by reliable information that there has
been no Cabinet decision on the subject, we
have been positively assured on the third day
that il Major Anderson cannot be relieved he
will be left himself to choose between starva-
ton, evacuation or capitulatiOn. FOurthly, all
the Washington correspondents concur in the
report that though Fort Sumter may be aban-
doned, Fort Pickens will be held by our GO
vernment Eat all hazards and to the last ex-
tremity."
Now here we have some strstagems of war,
the credit of which does not belong to the Pre-
sident or any member Of his Cabinet. The
finger of General Scott is in this pie. Fort
PickeBs is invested on the land side, by q
bssiegiDg force of three or four thousand men.
But the fort, out in the water on a sandbar, is
hard to got at, and well prepared for defensive
purposes. The besiegers are awaiting more
men and heavier artillery; the besieged are
expecting supplies and reinforcements Gen.
Scott, then, we will suppose, thus states his
case to the Cabinet-You must not
abandon Fort Sumter until you have sent
your provisions, munitions of war and
achievements into Fort Pickens; because,
otherwise, the three thousand fre-eaters and
their materials of war now investing Sumter
will be hurried off to Pensacola, and Pickens
will thus in few days be as far beyond your
means of relief as Sumter is to-day. AT this
information Honest Old Abe pricks up his
ears and mods his head approvingly; General
Cameron, the Secretary of War, knocks under
to The superior military sagacity of General
Scott, and it is resolved that those terrible
South Carolinians investing Fort Sumter must
be kept there until we are sure Of heading
them of at Fort Pickens.
General Scott having thus stolen march
upon General Davis, we may very soon now
expect to hear OF the evacuation of Fort Sum-
ter 1t is of no use to the United States against
the seeded States, as matters now stand; but
the case is far different with Fort Pickens and
its collateral securities. They are to great
extent the keys of the Gulf of Mexico, and in
the tug Of war between the United States and
the Confederate States, the former, in holding
Fort Pickens and its dependencies, will have an
immense advantage over the seeded States in
strategic, military, naval and commercial
point Of view. General jefferson Davis under
stands all this, and hence his concentration of
troops by the thousand, and of heavy guns
by the hundred, in front of Fort Pickens.
They must have that fort, or the threatened pri-
watering policy Of the Confederate States In
the Gulf of Mexico cannot be successfully at
tempted; and without said fort the absolute
independence of those States cannot be salts
factorily shown to England and France.
We have, therefore, every reason to believe
that all these movements Of ships Of the navy,
and steam transports, and men and munitions
Of war, on the part Of our federal administra-
ton, are directed to the relief reinforcement
and maintenance Of Fort Pickeus and, con.
sidering the importance Of that fortress to the
United States and to the Confederate States
for war purposes against each other, we may
soon expect to hear Of bloody collision there
which will open wide the gates of civil war
throughout the length and breadth OF the land.
SPRING AT LAsr.-Yesterday the metropolis
luxuriated in the FIRST real spring day Of the year
Of grace and revolution, 1861. The atmosphere
was heavy with the perfumes Of the tropics and
the Dust Of Hackley. Broadway glittered and