The Ashland union. [volume] (Ashland, Ashland County, Ohio) 1854-1868, 1863-12-23
From the London Timer. Nov. 20.
The war IN America-

Thu state Of war has rapidly become normal
I'm North yAmericz. The spark dropped ON
he suujburnt rrairie has filed the horisod
with Gre. and one sees no outlet-not . break
in the wall Of fame. War, having now raw
aged Eastern virgins. will either be contiu-
1ed under much greater Sisadvantages to the
Federal side in the Carolinas, or on the COM
paratiyely unexhausted soil of Pennsylvania.
On either side victory only entails q EEreater
distance from the basis of operations. Mean
while, there has started into sudden life . mill
itary class ; men who can do nothing but fight,
and who have no sooner spent their pay than
they take the bounty. There are now, on eth
er side, q host of Generals and men who hope,
soon to show themselves better Generals than
any vet tried. There Is an aristocracy said to
lie created by the war, contractors and manu-
t~faorurers of all the things wanted for this
most cousumptive and spendthrift Of wars.
Everybody is said to be enriched by the
war, and no doubt many thousands pray that
it may last their time. The SD buccaueering
spirit is thoroughly aroused, and the sea now
vies with the land in sudden productiveuess
and the ready prize. Glory. money, power
distinction, all that dazzies the crowd is.now
flung about broadcast. We do not hear a sim
gle protest against the war on the Federal
side on the ground of its private and public
injuries, 9ef anybody Who can speak thinks
himself better for it If the tide of war roll
northward, we shall hear another story Int
then, passions will come TO reinforce SELFISH
ness. If it be the turn of the Federals to see
their cities besieged and bombarded. theis1
homesteads ravagedg their harvests destroyed
and their country made a desert, they will ind
revenge the master Impulse But that re
venge they will have to seek under enhanc'd
difficulties. Nobody can doubt that they
will continue to seek it, but with what success
time alone can show.
Disabused as We all must be of our first
hopes as to the carly termination of the war.
perhaps we are driven by the force Of reason
to the other extreme. Yet every analogy jrs
tifes the worst fears. We cannot find much
fault with the Federals if they are as long
finding ont their mistake as we were 90 years
since. Mexico has been In q state of civil
war, diversified by foreign interference, for
years. Our own Wars of the Roses may bel
considered to have lasted 80 years, as did al
SO the German war of opinion. From the di-
v~isionsof the Roman Empire its territory was
for several centuries tho scene of an almost
incessant~ struggle between the so-called NORTH
err "barbarians'' and the moye settled inhabit-
ants of the South.
There is much to be said for the rather
gloomy anticipation that North America is BEL
ginning her Middle Ages, and that, with q
new variety of manners and forms, she will
follow the successive stages Of European pro-
gress, some fifteen hundred years Behind
What is there to make peace? There is no
third power to intervene at the happy juno
ture and Incredibly compel the yanqushed to-
accept the best terms. Both belligerents
have been taught to regard usas aliens and in
Hitherto the two siies have been
singularly balanced, for if numbers and Mor-I
ey have been on on, Q, side, personal stfe1gth
generalship and rational sent mentl'have been
on the other. Our old history tells us that
tile latter always constitute the winning side,
and tits at least difficult TO conceive that they
in this case be the characteristics o~flosers.