New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1863-01-26
THE GOLDEN MOMENT.

THE GOLDEN MOBiENT.
Campaigning is no holiday work, and Win
ter. campaign in Virginia is severe test OF
human capacities for endurance; yet the Union
is to be saved or lost while streams are full
and temperature low The Rebels have evinced
and will maintain q general superiority In
cavalry and N local knowledge; we can over
match them by steamboats, and by enlsting in
our service the good will and efforts of the
slaves. BY steamboats,, we can move our armies
at the rate of at least hundred miles por day,
and thus strike blows where they are sure to
tell; our gunboats are still terror to Treason
and bulwark to Loyalty, though some recent
blunders and cowardly surrenders may have
diminished the wholesome fear wherewith they
had for months been regarded by tho hosts
of Rebellion. We shall be grievousy disap-
pointed if they do not give new proofs of their
efficiency within the ensuing month. Whining
ton, Charleston, Savannah, aud Mobile are
trembling at the prospect of their visitations;
while Port Hudson and Vicksburg expect from
them the compliments Of the season, and are
making extensive preparations for returning
them. We are expecting every day to hear
gratifying advices from the heart of Arkansas,
and cannot doubt that Galveston has ere this
been made to suffer for the surprise and
butchery Of the LIST inst II will soon thunder
all around the horizon, and they who fancy
the vitality or vigor of the Union exhausted by
twenty months of warfare will read their mis-.
- a. .fa nd
That Vicksburg is soon to be assailed by far
stronger and better commanded force than that
recently repulsed from its intrenchments, Is
generally understood. We trust it will fall;
but, even il il shall not, the end contemplated
in besieging it may nevertheless be attained.
The Mississippi is now high and rising; the
canal destined to cuf of the Louisianian
peninsula which here tirusts itself far into
Mississippi must have been fully half dug last
Summer. Ten thousand contrabands with
picks, spades and wheefbarrows, can hardly
fail to lead stream through it within fort
night and then Vicksburg will speedily be-
come ali inland town of no strategic import
auce. Port Hudson is less formidable posi-
ton; and we trust February is TO see the
Father Of Waters once more Union river
from its source to its mouth, aud that the re-.
gon west Of it will very soon follow its fortunes
In fact, if Gen. McClernand has fully improved
his opportunities, Arkansas must be nearly lost
to Treason by the end Of this present January,
leaving but Texas and part of Louisiana TO
reannex." Should there be no serious failure,
we ought to have recovered Mississippi and
Alabama by the end of March. Only let the
slaves know that the Tennessee model is not to
be followed in their case, and the recovery of
those States will be cleared of half its diff.
Guilty.
If the Union Army on the Rappahannock
cannot move, we trust it will be largely de-
pleted to strengthen those which, under more
favoring auspices, are about to advance on the
remaining strongholds Of Rebellion. One half
of it's present strength can hold the line of the
RappahannOck against all corners, while the
residue would make itself powerfully felt on
the Mississippi, the Tennessee, or in the Car
olinas. Virginia may be conquered in the far
South; the cotton States cannot now DO re-
stored to tho Union by triumphs in Virginia.
The three best months for military operations
in the Gulf region are those directly before us,
and we are sure they will not pass unimproved.
With commander like Rosecrans, the army
now descending the Mississippi would know no
such word as fail.