, 1863-01-24
The Fighting Qualities of the American



At the first outbreak of the war the En-
glish tory journals INDUCED in many
laugh at the fighting qualities of the Amer
leans, North and South They laughed at
the idea of ten thousand soldiers investing
Fort Sumpter defended by garrison of
only seventy half-starved men, and fighting
for couple of days without killing any
one; they laughed at the panic which seiz-
ed both armies at Bull Run, and which
gave one the victory without its knowing
it; they laughed, in short, at everything
the North did, until the fight between the
Monitor and the Merrimac made them
laugh at the wrong side of their faces
Then they began to discover that we were
"a dangerous people'-a knowledge which
is being daily improved by the desperate
character Cf the Lattles-naval and militia
ry-that mark the course of the war.
1t is no wonder that the world should
stand aghast at the spectacle presented by
these conflicts. Nothing like them, as re-
CARDS the tenacity of the combatants and
the amount of life sacrificed, has been wit
messed in ancient or modern times. In the
wars of Alexander the Great, Caesar, and
even of Napoleon, great stress was laid on
the fact of an army being brought up to
fight second battle within week of the
time at which the first had taken place. A
long interval was deemed indispensable to
recruit the exhausted energies of the
troops. We have changed all that. The
American soldier not only fights several
battles in a week, from sunrise to sun
down, as was shown on the Peninsula and
in the way of endurance nothing has yet
been seen like the work done by the rag
ged shoeless and half-famished troops of
the Southern Confederacy, in whose gall
lantry, when the war is over, we shall, no
doubt, as Anglo-Saxons, take as much
pride as if we never were opposed to them
in deadly strife.
1t is no wonder that Englishmen should
feel an all-engrossing interest in the phys
ical aspects of the terrible contest now be-
ing waged here They offer to them not
merely question of the longer or shorter
duration of the war, but of prospective con
siderations involving far weightier conse-
quences to them than the continued de-
rangement of their manufacturing interests.
As to Intervention, no sane mind in Eng
land or France no longer contemplates the
probability of it. To produce the slightest
impression in a war conducted on such
tremendous scale it would cost England
and France larger armies and heavier ex-
peuditure than it would be possible for Ell
ther or both to maintain. Hostiities with
us, carried on at such distance from their
sources of supply and with the obstacles
interposed by three thousand miles of ocean,
would beggar both countries in twelve
month. Physically, as we'll as financially,
an armed Intervention is out of the ques-
tion; for no army that could be sent here
could succeed in efecting a debArkation in
the face of the immense fighting odds that
in few hours could be brought to bear on
any point of our coast on invading force
Secessionist sympathizers in England and
France have learned to appreciate these
facts, and hence the more respectful tone in
which they now speak of our military quail
ity. As the war progresses towards its ter
mination, they will discover that to forbear-
anee it will be prudent to add the virtue of
conciliation- N Y Herald