The weekly Ottumwa courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1857-1872, 1862-09-27
aEE OTTUMWA, IOWA, SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER "a, 1862.

allies on the continent had reason to think
that the French revolution menaced the sta
bility Of all the thrones Of Europe, surely we
have equal reason to hold, that the success
Of the Southern rebellion would not only be
fatal to the Union as 1t is, but would bring
with It the germ Of the threat Of still more
complete and ruinous disintegration of its
elements Fit be said, Oh, but the South!
ern States have Alright to secede, answer,
did not, revolutionary France think she had
a right to change her old aud corrupt mon
archy into a republic, and to initiate the ex1
ample Of England in bringing virtuous,
and, in the opinion Of its friends and adhe-
rents, unoffendng, sovereign, to the block ?
| England entered into this great war as a
war of principle, and before she had herself
been directly assailed by France and she
thought 1t right to carry on the war, and by
her subsidies and her auxiliary armies and
navies to assist her allies in carrying it on,
for twenty-three years. Not only so, but
she would probably think it an affront to
intimate that she would not have carried il
on for twenty three years longer, rather
succumb to the common enemy. Is il not
extremely unjust, therefore, at the end Of
less than year and half, to cry out against
the United States for the unreasonable pro-
longation of war which has not yet lasted
as many months as the war Of the French
revolution lasted years?
"Yes, but the war in the United States is
"doing us great harm The cotton spinners
"of Manchester, thrown out Of employment
"for went of the raw material. are cast upon
"the parish, and the silk weavers Of Lyons
'are starving for the want ofthe accustomed
''market for their tissues" These, admit,
are not triAing evils. We deeply regret
them; we have reason to do so, for we are
suffering also to some extent IN the same
way. But what are these evils compared
with the sufferings and sacrifices imposed
upon the industrial world, and especially
upon the neutral world, bv the war Of the
French revolution, especially after the CONT
mental system and DEGREES of Napoleon and
the orders in Council of England had sealed
the ports and swept the seas of every spe-
cies Of commerce not protected by the British
flag remembering too, that these oppres-
sive and rulnous orders and DEGREES are no W
admitted, by the highest British authority,
to have been in direc. contravention of the
law OF nations.
| Bat then we are told, "You make no pro-
gress; your cause is desperate" Now,
supposiug that this were as true as it is
manifestly otherwise suppose that the
war, instead Of being successful on nearly all
the importan. points, had been uniformly
disastero for the sixte en-
months that it has been car
ried on how many months, or rather how
many years, was it before steady geam Of
light shone upon the cause Of England and
the Allies? five expect the victories o.
England at sea and conquest Of the mara
time colonies Of France-the results of the
naval superiority of Great Britain, and which
may be compared to the almost uniform sue.
cess Of the naval operations of the United
States. the war against revolutionary France
presented for nearly twenty years an almost
unbroken series of reverscs; of feebly con
Quoted, abortve, and sometimes frightfully
disastrous expeditions, such as that against
] Walcheren on the part Of England, and
shameful defeats, territorial partitions, and
dynastic overturns, on the part of our allies
In fact, the historian Alison, not inclined
certainly to magnify the prowess Of France.
nor disparage that Of England and her allies
after naming the gallant British officers who
led the storming parties at the assault Of
Cindad Rodrigo, on the 10Th Of January
1912, Gust twenty years from the invasion
of France by the Prussians,> enthusias tical.
" exclaims, "with the exploits of these
brave men BEGAN the fall of the French
Empirer'
:" But the Union torccs'' (it is said) "are
constantly retreating. constantly defeate d
"you are outnumbered and outgeneralled
"again we tell you it is wicked to carry on
''the war; your calse is hopeless" Is II
more so than that Of the allies when the
Duke Of Brunswick was beaten back from
the heights of Valmy in 1892 when the
allies were defeated and the Duke of York
driven from Dunkirk by Houchard in 1898,
can event." says Alison, which changed
"the whole face Of the war from the "Ger.
man ocean to the Mediterranean sea !" when
Jourdan cleared Belgium of the allied forces
in 1894 when the first coalition was dis.
solved by the peace Of Bas!e in 1875 when
in 1896, the first marvellous campaign ot
Bonaparte commenced in Italy, which, after
series ofvictorics unparalleled in modern
history, ended in the treaty of Campo For
mio in 1897? Is our cause less promising
than that of the allies when, the British
navy, their right arm, which seldom struck
but to conquer, was pa ralyzed by land sus.
pended specie payment not to be resumed
for twenty years; when, in 1898, the rebels
sustained by French auxiliary force, de.
feated the English army and established a
provisional government in the heart of Ire
land when, in 1899, the Duke of York, at
the close Of the sixth year of the war, evac.
uated Holland, with the fragments Of the