The Sun. — 1861-06-19 (London, England)

MAY 25.  A visit to the camp at Tangipao, about 50 miles from New Orleans, gave an occasion for obtaining a clearer view of the internal military condition of those forces of which one reads so much and sees so little than any other way. Major-General Lewis, of the State Militia, and staff, and General Labuzan, a Creole officer, attended by Major Itannep, president of the New Orleans, Jackson, and Great Northern Railway, and by many officers in uniform, started with that purpose at 4.30 this evening in a railway carriage carefully and comfortably fitted for their reception. The militia of Louisiana has not been called out for many years, and its officers have no military experience and the men have no drill or discipline. Emerging from the swampy suburbs, we soon pass between white clover pastures, which we are told invariably salivate the herds of small but plump cattle browsing upon them. Soon cornfields, "in ' tassel," alternate with long narrow rows of growing sugar-cane, which, though scarcely a fourth of the height of the maize, will soon overshadow it ; and the cane-stalks grow up so densely together that nothing larger than a rattlesnake can pass between them.  MO 26.  • In the evening, as I was sitting in the house of a gentleman in the city, it was related as a topic of conversation that a very respectable citizen, named Bibb, had had a difficulty with three gentlemen, who insisted on his reading out the news for them from his paper as he went to market in the early morning. Mr. Bibb had a revolver " casually" in his pocket, and he shot one citizen dead on the spot, and wounded the other two severely, if not mortally. " Great sympathy," I am told, "is felt for Mr. Bibb." There has been a skirmish somewhere on the Potomac, but Bibb has done more business " on his own hook" than any of the belligerents up to this date ; and, though I can scarcely say I sympathise with him, far be it from me to say that I do not respect him. One curious result of the Civil War in its effects on the South will, probably, extend itself as the conflict continues—l mean the refusal of employers to pay their workmen, on the groand of inability. The natural consequence is much distress and misery. The English Consul is harassed by applications for assistance from mcchanics and skilled labourers who are 'in a state bordering on destitution and starvation. They desire nothing better than to leave the cetatry and return to their homes. All business, except tailoring for soldiering and cognate labours, are suspended. Money is not to be had. Bills on New York are worth little more than the paper, and the exchange against London is enormous-1S cent. discount from the par value of the gold in bank, good draughts on England having been negotiated yesterday at 92 per cent. Ono house has been compelled to accept 4 per cent. on a draught on the North where the rate was usually from a per cent. to per .cent. As I sat in a well-furnished clubroom last night listening to a ;host respectable, well-educated, intelligent gentleman, descantingon the practices of " the Thugs" an organised band who coolly and deliberately committed murder for the purpose of intimidating Irish and German voters, and were only put down by a Vigilance Committee, of which he was a member--I had almost to pinch myself to see that I was not the victim of a horrid nightmare.