Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1863-11-17
Rebel diplomacy.

II is no doubt embarrassing to the gifted
men who were sent out to Europe to save the
rebellion. in a diplomatic or commercial way,
TO have their letters and dispatches snapped
ND lust this side of their destination, and all
their interesting household secrets given TO
the winds But our vigilant blockaders off
Wilmington are no respecters of persons or
papers, especially when they find them sailing
under the black flag The last lot of cnpt.red
correspondence is of recent date, and gives
lively interior view of the diplomatic kitchen
kept by the confederates Oh the continent.
The letter Of Edwin De Leon-formerly our
consul in Egypt, and now one of the emissa-
ries-general of the rebels in Europe-tu jeff
Davis, most of which the reporter at New
York deemed of sufficient importance to telc-
graph all over the the country, Sunday night,
is one of the least touching of these mis-sen
letters.
The rest of them relate mainly to matters
connected with rebel trade with Europe, and
the desperate straits into which want of money
and OF credit has punched the agents. There
is Mercantile Trading Company" in Lon
don, engaged in furnishing ships, and goods
contraband, for running the blockade-of
which one Edgon p. Stringer is managing
director" and Col. c. A. Thorburn was just
appointed resident agent at Wilmington. He
was on his way thither with all this mass of
letters, when his vessel crossed the path of
our blockaders, and the plans of his company,
so far as concerned himself personally, were
temporarily deranged. Stringer gives Thor
burn propositions for furnishing steamers and
engines tor the confederate navy, accredting
to himself two and a half per cent.
commission for superintendent, and ''the
usual small charges;" and his company have
definite contract with the rebel authorities
at Richmond for running the blockade, which,
with the other documents, is now in the pos
session of our government.
The virtue of the ''maEaging director does
not come out of these great affairs untarnished.
Major Caleb Huse, a confederate agent at
Paris for the purchase of war materials,
vouched for by Mason, who has now taken
up his residence there, writes an expose OF
Stringer's practices, who seems to have been
In the habit of Morganizing on the rebel
treasury, taking large commissions for ficti-
tious services. and transacting business gen.
orally with that nexbility of conscience to
which even contractors sometimes attain.
Stringer, however, maintains placid dignity
and repose, the more serene, perhaps, for the
assurance that Huse is in the same boat. The
Mercantile Trading Company" had contract
ed to furnish Huse three hundred thousand
pounds worth of satpetre for the rebels but
reverses after reversee having trodden upon
a....o prer-s heels in the ''confederacy," and
Huses promises-to-pay losing something OF
their color, Stringer broke the contract
hence Huse's rage.
One other letter, signed 'Tom," and writ
ten by lieutenant in the rebel navy to fell
low officer at Mobile, is a free d-easy con-
fession of fellow in debt, whose gaiety by
the side Of the matter-of-fact accusation and
recriminatiOn OF Huse and Stringer, reminds
one of the song Of The jolly thief in the Fair
Maid of Perth =
'Sing three merry men. and three merry men,
And three merry men are we;
Thou on the land, and on the strand,
And Jack on the gallows treen
He wrote under date of 2Sth of September,
when the Florida was still at Brest. Out of
ninety of her men, sixty had deserted, or
rather refused to work, and were discharged
there. "Tom" gives an account of four
wooden vessels building in France for the
rebel navy, of twenty-five guns each, four or
six small iron-clads ('bull dogs"), and one
iron-clad frigate OF three thousand tons in Eng
land Since this letter was written Louis
Napoleon has laid his hand on the French
rams; and fate itself has turned its unfriend-
ly side to the naval operations of the doomed
confederates.