Year: 1864

following for publication. In note ac-
companying it, Mr.. Smith, says -" To
show that there is another side to the
picture of American decentralization, mis-
cry, and ruin drawn by the Times and
other reactionary journals, l send the sub
Joined extract from letter which re-
ceived some days ago from America. The
writer is not a stump orator or political
adventurer: he is one of the most distln-
guished as well as one of the most excel
lent of the class of highly-cultiyated and
refined men who we have been so often
told stand aloof, in sullen dlsaffection,
from the coarse, corrupt, and turbulent
politics of the vulgar republic"


There is nothing like exhaustion at
the North, and the determination to put
down the rebellion, at whatever cost, is as
strong as ever. For, as wrote the other
day to another friend in England, the war
has not been in vain. The convictions of
the people have been SO strengthened by
it, not only in respect to the nature OF our
institutions, that there is no risk of their
giving up the contest in WEAKNESS or des-
pair. The war has done more than any
thing else could have done to animate
and invigorate our efforts to establish our
great community on the permanent foun-
dutions of social justice and free religious
and political convictions. 1thas develop
ed the sense of nationality, and led to 4
clearer understanding of the nature and
worth of the principles embodied in our
institutions, and to which our national
life gives expression. We have not in
deed failed to suffer from the evils Incl
dent to war, but these have been more
than made up by the development of in
dividual character and the confirming OF
those moral ideas which lie at the foun-
dation of politics and government. The
love of liberty and the desire for justice
have been intensified. Hitherto we have
been a democracy in name, in form, in
externals, but the war is making us de-
mocracy in reality. Hitherto we have
talked much of the rights of man; we
are learning to believe in them now as no
people ever yet has believed in them.


"In its progress the war is thus separat-
ing us, as you have observed, more widely
than we have hitherto been separated from
England and the Old World generally. 1t
is deepening the contrast between us. 1t
is the prelude of revolutions. For in de-
stroying the power founded upon slavery
we are striking blow against class privi-
leges, against despotism under whatever
form, against the remains OF feudallsm IN
Europe. But still more than this-the
force, the intelligence, the self-control, the
wealth, the happiness of people under
free popular institutions will be so mani.
tested in our success that the progress OF
Democracy in other nations cannot but
be quickened by it. There is truth in the
phrase of our being standing menace TO
Europe, if it is accepted in moral sig
MITIGATION, as referring to the force OF our
example and our moral influence. In any
other sense it is purely false, for no nation
in the world is so bound to peace as we
are.


"I write from little village among the
hills in the western part OF the state
where 1 have come with my family TO
pass few of the hot weeks of summer:
It is pretty New England village, and 1
wish that you were here to see the pictur-
esque scenery that surrounds it, and still
more to observe the character and con-
dition of its population. There is no such
pleasant place in the world as one OF these
villages, for nowhere else is there TO De
found settlement in which there IS such
universal comfort and intelligence. There
are no poor; everybody is well OH; almost
everybody is respectable; everybody has
good future in prospect. Life wants
many Of the charms and graces that De,
long to that of highly cultivated ana
aristocratic society. Inequalities make a
picturesque variety in society as in land
scape; but democracy has not yet pro-
duced its final results on society, and see
the signs of finer manners, of fnobler oreeo,
ing, and of better life than any the world
has known. My neighbor, the doctor
Mr.. -, thefarmer on the hill Mr.: ,
the inn-keeper, are good in themselves
still better in promise. There is but one
Irish family in the township, and they l
hear, are getting on well, and VIII, no
doubt soon be American. ."-LoTdo" StdT'
August 5th.